#Life´s too short for weird music

[kraftwerk113]

2023 – Crisis – what crisis? 

A life´s too short for weird music review of 2023

Immer dann, wenn eine Krise die nächste jagt, zeigt sich die wahre Stärke der Popkultur und deren Output. Denn Popmusik kann neben Identifikation, Abgrenzung, sozialer und politischer Kritik auch Trost und Lebensfreude transportieren. Und von letzteren war der Bedarf in 2023 gefühlt immens hoch. Und die Popkultur und ihre Maschinerie verstand es in2023 wie selten in diesem Jahrzehnt gegen alle Krisen anzusingen und dafür Sorge zu tragen, dass zumindest ein zarter Optimismus auch im Hinblick auf die unsichere Zukunft auf welche die Welt hinsteuert erhalten bleibt. 

2023 ist ein Jahr voller popmusikalischer Highlights, wie ich sie in diesem Jahrtausend vielleicht allenfalls in 2005 und im Corona-Krisenjahr 2020 in dieser Dichte erlebt habe. Es gab einige (nicht zu erwartende) Comebacks, allen voran Everything but the girl mit dem „sofisticated“ FUSE- Album, The National, die sich wieder zusammengerauft haben, um gleich zwei Alben innerhalb Jahresfrist zu veröffentlichen, Depeche Mode mit Memento Mori, dem schwierigen ersten Longplayer nach dem Tod von Andrew Fletcher und Slowdive, die auch auf Everything is alive Shoegaze- Sounds vom Feinsten boten. 

Aber auch die Debütant*innen wussten in 2023 zu überzeugen: Romy, die als letzte der drei The XX Musiker*innen solo mit Mid Air debütierte und Avalon Emerson, die auf dem ersten Soloalbum & the charm ihre bisherigen Techno-Electro geprägte Sound- Palette in wunderbaren Elektropop transferierte. 

Und in 2023 zeigte sich auch, dass Kollaborationen im Sinne von kurzfristigen oder gar einmaligen Zusammenarbeiten oft zu hervorragenden Ergebnissen führten. Auf die Spitze trieb es dabei David Holmes, der quasi ein ganzes Album (Blind on a galloping horse) zusammen mit seinem Patenkind – der Sängerin Raven Violet – einspielte. Auch der vielversprechende Anthony Smierek war in einigen hervorzüglichen Colabos zu hören. 

Und so kommt insbesondere bei den Top 50 der Kurzen (Singles/Tracks) leider viel zu häufig der Rasenmäher zum Einsatz, will sagen: die Streichliste (also die Songs, die außerhalb der Top 50 verblieben) ist enorm, da 2023 auch in der Dichte – nicht nur in der Spitze – ein ausgezeichneter musikalischer Jahrgang ist.

Auch bei den Langen (Alben) zeigt sich eine erfreuliche Dichte. Endlich mal wieder ein Jahrgang, bei welchem ich mich aufgrund des umfangreichen Angebotes schwertue, die Top 20 herzuleiten. 

Die Top Alben hingegen sind unbestritten – das beste Album von Depeche Mode zumindest in den 2000ern (Memento Mori), sowie das unerwartet starke Comeback der von starken persönlichen Problemen leidgeprüften The National mit The first two pages of Frankenstein dem noch besseren von gleich zwei guten Alben, die innerhalb von wenigen Monaten veröffentlicht wurden. Dass es sich lohnt, Stücke, die während einer Aufnahmesession verworfen wurden, nochmals aufzuarbeiten und dann doch zu veröffentlichen, zeigt nicht nur The Laugh Track von The National, hiermit wussten auch Belle and Sebastien zu überzeugen als sie unter dem ziemlich ironischen Titel Late developers Anfang 2023 Songs in die Welt gaben, die es – aus welchen Gründen auch immer – nicht auf das in 2022 veröffentlichte Album A bit of previous geschafft hatten. Und ganz ehrlich im Vergleich schneidet Late developers nochmals besser ab als sein Vorgänger. Erwähnenswert ist vielleicht an dieser Stelle, nochmals die Vielzahl an qualitativen Comeback-Alben, sei es von OMD, Madness oder Blur, die sich allesamt als zeitgenössisch, relevant und keineswegs in Nostalgie verhaftet erwiesen haben.

Und hier sind nun die Life´s too short Playlists für 2023, wie immer zunächst die Top 50 der besten Songs und dann die Top Twenty der besten Alben des Jahres. 

2023 – die Kurzen

1 The National / Tropic Morning news

2 Depeche Mode / Before we drown

3 Roosevelt / Rising

4 David Holmes / Necessary genius (feat Raven Violet)

5 Sleaford Mods / West End Girls

6 Slowdive / Kisses

7 Everything but the girl / Run a red light

8 The Chemical Brothers / Skipping like a stone (feat. Beck)

9 Romy / Enjoy your life

10 Avalon Emerson / Hot evening

11 King Creosote / Blue Marbled Elm Trees

12 Everything but the girl / Cautions in the wind

13 Zoot woman / Live and learn

14 Depeche Mode / Ghosts again

15 Everything Everything / Cold reactor

16 Belle and Sebastian / When you´re not with me

17 Sufjan Stevens / Will anybody ever love me?

18 The National / New Order T- Shirt

19 Weval / Are you real

20 Roosevelt / Yucca Mesa & Paralyzed

21 Thundercat and Tame Impalla / No more lies

22 Orbital / Are you alive (feat Penelope Isles)

23 Avalon Emerson / Sandrail Silhouette

24 Sofia Kourtesis / How music makes you feel better

25 Slowdive / Shanty

26 Roosevelt / Luna

27 Blur / Barbaric

28 Bombay Bicycle Club / I want to be your only pet

29 Future Utopia / We were we still are (feat. Kae Tempest

30 Avalon Emerson / A vision

31 Hot Chip / Fire of mercy (feat. yuné pinku)

32 Haiku Hands / Feels so good

33 NZCA Lines / Push Reset

34 Depeche Mode / People are good

35 Rahill / Fabbles (feat Beck)

36 Sofia Kourtesis / Si te portas bonito

37 Jungle / I´ve been in love (feat. Channel Tres)

38 Future Utopia / Something real

39 Wild nothing / Dial Tone

40 The Chemical Brothers / Live again (feat. Halo Maud)

41 Bombay Bicycle Club / Tekken 2 (feat. Chaka Khan)

42 Jake Shears / Voices (ft. Kylie Minogue)

43 Gorillaz / Silent running (feat. Adeleye Omotayo)

44 Phoenix / All eyes on me (feat Benee, Chad Hugo and Pusha T.)

45 Sufjan Stevens / A running start

46 Interplanetary and Porij / Don´t hurt me

47 Romy / Weightless

48 Disclosure / Higher than ever before

49 Lynks / New boyfriend

50 GUM / Would it pain you to see?

2023 – die Langen

1 Depeche Mode / Momento mori

2 The National / The first two pages of Frankenstein Alien

3 Roosevelt / Embrace

4 Slowdive / Everything´s alive

5 Avalon Emerson / & the charm

6 Belle and Sebastien / Late developers

7 Everything but the girl / Fuse

8 Sufjan Stevens / Javelin

9 Romy / Mid Air

10 Bombay Bicycle Club / My big day

11 The National / The Laugh Track

12 Blur / The Ballad of Daren

13 Orbital / Optical delusion

14 Jungle / Volcano

15 Gorillaz / Cracker Island

16 Sleaford Mods / UK Grim

17 Chemical Brothers / For that beautiful feeling

18 OMD / Bauhaus Staircase

19 Madness / Theatre of the absurd presents: Cést la vie

20 Jake Shears / Last man dancing

[huggybearluvr]

Next Thing You Know || Q.H

Series Masterlist

Synopsis: After meeting Quinn at a bar in your 20's you can't believe how fast the time flies.

The song links:

Apple Music || Spotify || Youtube

y/nmathews

liked by yourbestfriend, quinnhughes, and others... y/nmathews met this guy at a bar and next thing you know he's my boyfriend....

view all comments...

yourbestfriend I'll kill him. He better treat you right.

y/nmathews oh he is girl

austonmathews do i know him. does he play hockey. and how old is he.

y/nmathews idk. maybe. lols

quinnhughes seems like a stud

jackhughes that back looks familiar....

y/nmathews no it doesn't!

lukehughes YES IT DOES @quinnhughes

quinnhughes shut up.

jackhughes @austonmathews do we approve of this?

austonmathews i'm just glad it isn't you with your grubby hands.

jackhughes excuse me?

quinnhughes

liked by y/nmathews, lukehughes, and others

quinnhughes never thought I could love like this.

view all comments...

jackhughes thought you said you were staying single for awhile

lukehughes he did infact say that.

quinnhughes don't be mad that you guys cant pull like I can

y/nmathews I love you <3

quinnhughes I love you more baby

ellenhughes such sweethearts

austonmathews this is...

jackhughes nasty?

lukehughes absoutely fucking crazy?

y/nmathews can you guys leave us alone please?

austonmathews sorry.

jackhughes im not

lukehughes me either

quinnhughes .

yourbestfriend OKAY THIS IS CUTE

quinnhughes

liked by y/nmathews, jackhughes, and others

quinnhughes next thing you know she moved in! ... and brought her weird ass dog with her...

view all comments

austonmathews the first picture...

y/nmathews is so cute!

austonmathews no.

y/nmathews WEIRD ASS DOG?! excuse me sir Zues is a little baby

quinnhughes he could squash us both.

y/nmathews hes. a. little. baby.

quinnhughes he ways 140 pounds...

y/nmathews shhhhh he's my baby.

mitchmarner @austonmathews YOU LET HER TAKE THE DOG?!

austonmathews its her dog?

mitchmarner NO NO NO It was yours as much as it was hers.

y/nmathews he didn't take care of that dog, it was all me.

mitchmarner zues squared tho :(...

y/nmathews ill bring him with me when I visit.

y/nmathews

liked by austonmathews, mitchmarner, and others...

y/nmathews Mrs. y/n hughes has a ring to it.

view all comments...

quinnhughes I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with you baby

y/nhughes I love you more than anything else in this world

austonmathews when he asked for my blessing, I didn't think he would propose so quickly.

quinnhughes oops?

austonmathews if she's happy, I'm happy.

y/nmathews im more than happy :)

jackhughes god she's gonna be moms favorite now

ellenhughes she already is :)

lukehughes MOM NO I AM

quinnhughes in your dreams Luke it was me before y/n

yourbestfrind AWWWW BABY

y/nmathews my maid of honor <3

quinnhughes

liked by y/nhughes, ellenhughes, and others...

quinnhughes the best weekend of my life. To my beautiful wife, I love you more than any words could ever say. You are the sunshine of my life and I have no idea where I would be without you. Thank you for choosing me to spend the rest of your life with.

view all comments....

y/nhughes wouldn't wanna be doing life wiht anyone else. I love you quinn.

quinnhughes I love you too baby

jackhughes congrats to both of you! I love you both.

y/nhughes awww rowdy, we love you

ellenhughes Congratulations! welcome to the family officially y/n!

y/nhughes thank you!!

austonmathews You got a good one Quinn. Congrats to both of you!

lukehughes huggy is all grown up :(

quinnhughes i've been grown.

y/nhughes

liked by jackhughes, yourbestfriend, and others...

y/nhughes the honesymoon has been nothing short but amazing.

view all comments...

austonmathews Zues misses his parents come back soon

y/nhughes or do you just miss me?

austonmathews ...

jackhughes QUINNS A SIMP

y/nhughes I can't deny that

quinnhughes for her yes I am a simp.

quinnhughes mrs. quinn hughes looking great!

y/nhughes mr. quinn hughes looking even better

lukehughes vomit.

y/nhughes

liked by quinnhughes, jackhughes, and others...

y/nhughes surprise! baby hughes on the way!

view all comments...

austonmathews I'M GONNA BE AN UNCLE?!

jackhughes WE ARE GONNA BE UNCLES?!

lukehughes WEE ARE GONNA BE UNCLES?!

mitchmarner WEEE ARE GONNA BE UNCLES?!

y/nhughes yes you are ALL gonna be uncles.

austonmathews so like whose the god father...?

jackhughes me

lukehughes uhmmmm no me.

quinnhughes both of you stop.

ellenhughes congrats! the baby is gonna be a little angel!

quinnhughes I am so excited baby!

y/nhughes me too! Can't wait for little nugget.

quinnhughes

liked by y/nhughes, jackhughes, and others...

quinnhughes surprise twin boys! Y/n and I are so excited to introduce Sawyer Warren Hughes and Seth Auston Hughes.

view all commments...

y/nhughes I am so excited to be doing life with you and them! I can't picture a better family! I love your three more than anything in this entire world.

quinnhughes and we love you all the way to the moon and back baby.

austonmathews you named one of them after me?

mitchmarner he is quite literally crying rn.

y/nhughes awww Aus, come over and meet your god children :)

austonmathews are you being serious? I am the god father???

quinnhughes we couldn't think of any one more perfect for the role

lukehughes I am so honored.

y/nhughes we love you lukey.

[honeycloudz]

let me be Anonymous since im going to ask-No beg for the cringest one🙏

(p1:who's she?

p2:Haitani's

p1: which one? the youngest's?

p2: nhh both of them)

I means Just image being the wife of Haitani brothers's/their precious and only treasure ofc their personal c*mdump tooTvT.

alr this's kinda weird but Writing this or not is your choice

anywayy Loves you and please takecare of yourself

-s🍁

Stargirl Interlude (☆)

Content Warnings: DARK CONTENT, MDNI, Porn with Plot, Toxic!Dom!Ran & Toxic!Dom!Rindou x Fem!Sub!Reader, Alcohol mentions, Stalking, Forced into Contract, Dub! Consent, Degradation theyre so mean :(,  Possessiveness, Dumbification, Unprotected Sex, Oral (Female to Male Receiving), Throat Fucking, Rough Sex, Hair pulling, Spit Play, Choking, Nipple Play, Overstimulation, and finally Squirting

Playlist: Belonging to the Haitani's

My apology for disappearing again, not proof read

You should know better, you tell yourself as you walk down the busy streets of Roppongi’s nightlife. You should know better than to play with the infamous Haitani brothers. Truthfully, you were just trying to get your life together, and money is money, so you took a chance on that sketchy ad from a week ago, unknowing that it would lead you here.

Squirming, you pull your mini skirt down, in a failed attempt to cover yourself from prying eyes as you walk your way down to the club. Even from a distance your eyes catch the glimmering signs, and you can feel the bass of the speakers beneath your high heeled feet. You get closer, to the club, noticing all the intoxicated people staggering in and out of the Haitani’s club in varying levels of inebriation. 

It was too late to have second thoughts, so you mentally prepare yourself as you take a step into the very lively club. Loud music blares in your ears as you squint and try to walk around the sea of bodies that are dancing. You don't necessarily like the thought of sweaty drunk bodies bumping and grinding up on you, so you choose to find an easier route. Looking around, you almost give up before sharp lavender eyes meet your own. Your breath hitches but you don't look away, you try to ignore the chill working its way up your spine at his menacing gaze. 

Seconds that feel like hours pass as you hold eye contact with the dual-dyed short purple haired man. You were intimidated but intrigued. 

And Ran saw that in you- he noticed you right when you walked in, all panicked and cute. He immediately knew that it was you from the ad you signed up for, he laughed under his breath a bit, you had no idea what you were getting into. 

He breaks eye contact with you momentarily to look at his brother in the booth. They make eye contact and Ran points at you with his chin, nodding off to his brother, to alert him of your presence. When Rindou follows Rans line of sight his eyes meet you and immediately Rindou stands, stalking his way towards you.

You didn't notice Rindou until you felt a hand on your shoulder, making you jump as you turned around and tilt your head up to meet the tall man. “Y/n…?” He questioned even though he knew the answer. “Y-Yes?” Rindou leans into you and your face heats up for a moment as you feel his breath on your cheek before he whispers “follow me”. You almost didn't hear because of the music but he made sure you followed when he grabbed you by the hand and dragged you to the private room only he and his brother had access to. 

Making your way in, you look around in awe. A spacious room with a glimmering chandelier above you was the scene before your excited eyes. You take in more of your surroundings and you realize just how out of place you seem. Twiddling with your fingers, you look up at Rindou unknowing what to do next. He peers down at you, before placing a hand on your lower back and guiding you to the couch, “Sit here please”. He says giving you a smile that seemed sinister rather than kind and you take a seat trying to fight off the bad feeling you were having.

“Its nice to finally meet you Y/n” Rindou knew he was lying, but he had to remain calm and calculated, watching your every move, eyeing your nervousness as you once again try to flatten the short skirt that's hardly covering your thighs. You gulp, “Yeah, Nice to meet you too Mr. Haitani.” your voice drips like honey in his ears. ‘Mr. Haitani’ huh? He’ll make sure to keep that in mind when he’s training you to be his good obedient slut. “No need for formalities, pretty girl, you can use them.. Later.” It almost sounded threatening, which didnt help your nerves. You didnt have much time to think about it when you heard the door creak open, revealing the tall short haired man that was eyeing you earlier. Rindou stood, striding over to his older brother before whispering a few things back and fourth to one another. 

Quickly looking away, you make eye contact with the floor as you play with the hem of your skirt. You look up when you feel a dip in the couch next to you. “Hey” he sighs out dreamily, laying back one arm wrapped around the couch near your shoulder, the other sitting on his man spreaded lap, far too comfortable, far too soon. “I see you like the outfit I sent you to come here in '' Ran isn't ashamed when he's taking in your figure, wrapped in the tightest, shortest, skimpiest clothes he could find for you.

“H-hello, Im Y/n '' you shudder, wrapping your arms around yourself in an attempt to hide from his unwavering stare. The staring had increased your anxiety, it's not everyday that a person meets someone like the Haitanis. “I know who you are sweetheart, Infact, I know all about you” he looks at your shaken form and continues, “Im Ran by the way, Rindou and I are gonna take care of you, financially and in any way you want, isnt that what you need sweetheart?” You blink and nod slowly at him. “In turn, we want you to ourselves. Do you understand?” He lifts his hand that's near your shoulders and begins twirling your hair in between his fingers. After a few seconds of thinking it over, you ask, “What did you mean you know all about me?” you hesitantly and softly ask your question. Ran looks at his brother, almost ignoring your question, as if they weren't the ones that have been watching you for months now. “Nothing you need to worry your pretty little head about. Be ours.” You notice the dangerous flash in their eyes, they were not asking you, they were demanding. You stand quickly, “Um, I think I should g-” Rindou cuts you off by standing at the door and crossing his arms. “Sit down. Now. I wont ask you twice.” At his tone you shuffle back to your seat, sitting opposite from Ran in an attempt to back away from the men. “Love.. Don't look so scared, we would never hurt you” Ran cups your face gently, holding your chin between his thumb and index finger that were adorned by shiny rings. He rubs his thumb over your cheek while holding eye contact, “We just need you to sign a little paper for us, then you can have anything you've ever dreamed of, isn't that what you want sweetheart?” Ran questions, leaning in closer, holding your gaze. “I- I don't kn-” “Sign the paper.” Ran’s fingers grow tighter around your face. “I need to think about th-” “Now.”

Rindou grabs your hand and puts a pen in it, continuing to hold onto it as it inches near the signature mark. “Right here, pretty girl.” And against your will, with a hand holding yours to sign a signature, you sealed your fate, selling your soul away to the devils in the room.

Ran had called his chauffeur to drive you home, upon the arrival of his expensive car, you weren't expecting them to hop in the back with you. Sandwiched in between the two muscular men, you tried to comprehend and digest what just happened to you. “What are you gonna have me do?” You apprehensively ask the men next to you, getting more anxious when you hear deep chuckles next to you. “You'll see” Rindou hums under his breath and traces feather light shapes with his fingertips on your knee, working his way up your thigh causing your inhale to get caught in your throat.  You’re very grateful when the car screeches to a halt. Quickly rising from your seat, you avoid Ran’s lap and open the door to hop out. Not waiting for the men in the car, you turn your heel and walk to the direction of your door, hearing their footsteps behind you. You go to shut your door quickly but Ran catches it and forces it open. “Its not very polite to slam a door in someone's face princess, but we will work on your manners soon enough.” Ran barked out at you, causing his brother to laugh much to your dismay, feeling the hotness creep its way up your face. “Oh before we forget, we will be texting you tomorrow on your first command”. Rindou added after catching his breath. You went to sleep that night, questioning everything that happened to lead you to this moment of your life. Because of those two, this is gonna be the beginning of your new everything, whether you like it or not. 

The brothers were patient with you, after all, you had been weary of them the first few weeks of being around them. At this point, youve been ‘working’ for them for about 7 months, feeling much more comfortable around them. Taking things slow, they only recently started asking you for kisses, cuddles and comfort after a long day of working. You obliged of course, it wasn't much you had to do for them in the first place. 

Theyve been paying you well, enough to make a living and be able to quit your shitty job. After really getting to know the Haitani’s and their past, they decided to take the next big step in your companionship together, and ask you to move in with them. Hesitant but ready, you move all your belongings into their penthouse and after a few days, you're finally finished. “Phew '', you sigh out, adding the finishing touches on the wall. You back away and look all around you, framed pictures covering the big wall of you and the Haitani brothers and your adventures. You smile contently when you feel an arm wrap around your waist and a few quick kisses on your nape. You giggle at the ticklish feeling and turn around to see Ran looking down at you, in a more intense way than usual. You tilt your head and look at him for a few quiet seconds, “Is everything okay..?” You ask uneasily when his eyes darken. He leans into your ear and lightly laughs, causing shivers to go down your spine, which doesnt go unnoticed by the older Haitani. “Oh its more than okay sweetheart” he rasps out and bites the spot below your ear lightly. His own heart picks up speed when he hears you whimper, blood rushes to his cock at the sound. He needs to hear more. He doesn't give you time to think when you're suddenly being slammed against the wall, a hand gripping your throat and the other grasping onto your waist tightly. He kisses you hard, his teeth clashing against your own and his tongue finding a new home in your mouth. Muffled squeaks and whines are making their way out of your throat while animalistic groans are coming from his. You place your hands against his shoulders and attempt to push him away which in turn tightens his grip on your throat. Heat pools between your thighs as you get light headed from the feeling. He pulls his mouth away from yours, a line of spit connecting you both, to admire the flushed look on your face, and the drool sneaking its way past the side of your lip at his actions. He laughs and lets go of your throat to swipe away the drool, entertained by the way your chest is heaving up and down to catch your breath. Ran pulls away from you completely and you whine at the loss when Rindou enters your vision. “Somethin’ wrong pretty?” He teases taking in your trembling form. The glint in his eye darkens when he sees his pretty angel squeezing her thighs together. The brothers both stare down at you waiting for a response. You look back at them in desperation and embarrassment, they know what you want, they just wanna hear you say it. “I… I want you both” you manage to say between their nearly predatory peering. “Want us how?” Ran questions back. “Tell us exactly what you want pretty girl” 

You whine and through your embarrassment you squeak out “Wan’ to be fucked by you both, p-please.” 

And then it happens. Youre being picked up and whisked away before you even realize whats happening. You squeal when you're tossed in the air and sink into the comfortable couch of the living room.

Rindou’s kissing you now - kissing you in like you were his favorite taste. Drinking in your breathless gasps as Ran begins unbuttoning your top, letting it fall to the floor and- 

“Fuuuck.” he lets out a low whistle, “Come look at this.”

With an almost-annoyed groan, Rindou pulls away from your sweet lips. Eyes widening as he takes in the sight of you - braless, and exposed shamefully in front of both of them, of course. “No bra?” he mutters raspily. “Always knew you were a lil’ slut, pretty.” But you knew by the way his breath hitches that he liked it.

Ran clearly did too as his mouth attached itself to your pebbled nipple, fingers pinching the other lightly. You let out short breathless gasps of air as his tongue swirls around. Rindou throws his head back as he palms his hard on through his pants and groans. He sits between your thighs as Ran lays to your side, continuing his assault on your chest. 

“I bet she’s got such a slutty pussy too Rin” his brother calls out. “Only one way to see” The poor, flimsy fabric of your short shorts didn't stand a chance as Rindou tears it in two. You squeeze your eyes shut from being so exposed, and when you dont feel touches on you at all you open them to see both men staring at your drenched panties in absolute awe. 

“Ah ah” Ran tuts, seeing the way your thighs were trying to close, holding them down he chooses to not let you have even some semblance of dignity. “Youre gonna be a good slut f’us right?”  You nod your head up and down and gasp when you feel a few kisses from between your thighs, inching higher and higher up. “Use your words sweetheart.” Ran tsks from above you. “Y-Yes I will be, please just- please keep going.” You whine, bucking your hips in the air slightly. In another quick rip your panties are discarded off of you, and Rindou taking opportunity of your distraction dives face first into your pussy. He groans at the taste, of course you were so sweet, so good on his tongue. The taste addictive as your fingers quickly pull and tug on his hair. “Shit, shit, shit” you gasp, pulling him harder against you. He moves his tongue easily against your wet cunt, sloppily, uncaring of the sting on his scalp. 

You get lost in the pleasure as Rindou sucks your twitching clit into his mouth to swirl his tongue around it, making your back arch off the sofa. “Hngh- fuck- Feel’s good.” you whine, bucking your hips wildly.

“Yeah? Ya like this?” Rindou attempts to speak, words muffled around your clit. Sucking and rolling his tongue harshly across it. Over and over again.  Your whines and gasps turn into long drawn out moans as Ran unbuckles and unzips his pants. He pulls his cock out and you gawk at his size. Long, with an angry red tip and a pretty vein that runs on the side, you see the precum sliding down the length of it as he grips the base a few times. 

“Open wide f’me pretty” you let your tongue lol out of your mouth as he grips your jaw, lowering his face to meet your own, teary eyed one before he lets a glob of spit fall directly on to your awaiting tongue. “Swallow” He demands as he strokes his shaft a few times and then groans at the sight of you swallowing obediently. He squishes your cheeks and puckers your lips from his tight hold with one hand and holds his cock with his other hand, smacking it against your mouth a few times before he lets go. Having done that, Ran’s stuffing himself into your mouth. A low hiss leaving the back of his throat as you take him so well, lips bulging around his thick cock. Tonguing at the sensitive slit in a way that makes him lose his mind. 

Gags and sputters of your breath are heard as he holds you down, waiting for you to adjust. Big tears prick the corner of your eyes as you breathe harshly through your nose, slowly bobbing your head up and down. “Fuuuuck” Ran lets out a long groan, “You like being our whore doll?” and he swears he almost cums down your throat when he feels you nod against him, continuing to let out muffled whines at Rindou’s unrelenting pace. 

Maybe it was Ran’s filthy words - so filthy even when he was calling to you sweetly. Or maybe it was the way Rindou was grinding his jaw as he plunged his soft tongue deeper into your plushy walls. Probably it was how they both looked at you - like you were their last meal. 

Because you’re cumming, and cumming so messily all over Rindou’s mouth in a long moan that vibrates against Ran’s cock causing him to shudder, and pulling your hair into a makeshift ponytail as he bobs your head up and down.  Rindou pulls away and licks his lips, not bothering to wipe away your cum thats staining his chin and jaw. He pulls down his pants, tugging just enough that his swollen cock springs out, letting his thumb rub against his weeping tip that was dripping all the way down his length. 

And if you thought Ran was being mean then you weren’t prepared for Rindou at all. Not with the way he poked his swollen tip into your snug cunt. Throwing his head back he slowly inches more and more into you, groaning at the heavenly feeling of your tight walls against him. 

“Shit- s’tight, fuck” Rindou lets out a few gasps, jaw clenched, trying his hardest not to just fuck into your overstimulated pussy until you’re drunk on his cock. But damn- its made difficult for him when all he gets in response from you is a choked, wet gurgles. Body bowing into both of theirs as you desperately try to relax both your throat and your cunt.

He tightens his grip on your hips, hard enough that your pretty sure youll bruises tomorrow.

“What do you think, pretty? Want me to fuck this tight lil’ pussy? Ruin you on my cock?” 

Ultimately, the only response he gets is a wet moan.

“Awww, look at her- hah- Cock-drunk little slut can’t even speak.” is the last thing you hear Rindou say as he pushes past your ring of resistance, thrusting in deep and hard into your poor pussy. He pulls back all the way to push back in roughly enjoying the sound of your mangled moans. He hits so deep and angles his cock to hit right against your g-spot. You suck up his cock so fucking sinfully as his heavy balls smack repeatedly your ass, already so wet with your slick and his precum. 

“Fuck, youre so good.” Ran hums, the image of you choking on his cock while you struggle to take Rindou making him dizzy. Rindou continues to reel his hips back, all the way till his tip is just outside of you, before slamming back into your sloppy holes recklessly. Harsh thrusts fueled by the need to make you cum again, this time on his cock. 

Ran taps at your cheek, making you blink your teary eyes up at him, he cant help but want to match Rindou’s pace and pump your mouth full of cum. “Gonna cum all over your pretty face” Ran groans, wrapping his large hand around your throat.

He feels your moans and gasps increase as the sound vibrates around his cock- “Are- fuck- hah- are you close baby?” and all you can do is nod pathetically and cry against him. 

“Fuck, I can feel it too.” Rindou voices from behind, “Squeezin’ me so hah- t-tight” It’s his cue to reach down and start toying with your swollen clit, still so sensitive and sore from before. Drawing little circles on it, pinching with his fingers.

It was hard for them to look at your ruined form, mascara dripping down your face without cumming on the spot, you looked so utterly fucked out that it was almost painful. 

They sped up their pace impossibly fast against you. Rindou’s fingers draw quick circles against your clit, so hard and fast as he hits your g-spot with every thrust he makes. 

“Cmon- fuck- cum for us doll”

This orgasm hits you more intensely than the last. Far more intensely. You tremble in their hold and see stars behind your eyes as you drench Rindou’s pelvis with your cum. You feel them both slam into you, once, twice, before theyre both spilling into you. Ran’s taste is slightly bitter in your mouth, not that you mind when hes pumping thick hot ropes of cum into your mouth, pulling out and watching you drool it out deliriously, smearing some of it on your face with his thumb like the depraved man he is. Rindou is the opposite, keeping his twitching cock stuffed inside of you while he paints your walls white, making sure you dont waste a single drop. 

Eventually they pull out and fall against the sofa with you, catching their breaths and sweating. You're left exhausted against Ran’s arms carrying you as Rindou draws a warm bath for you, falling asleep in their hold as they clean you. You wake up groggy and sore in the morning with a note and a water bottle on your bedside. You didnt feel either brother next to you which wasnt an uncommon occurrence, as they have to wake up at odd hours of the night for club duties. Opening your phone you see a text from Rindou that read, ‘we’re sorry we cant be there when you wake up, but know we have a driver waiting for you outside to bring you here for more fun x’. You giggle at the text and pick out the skimpiest outfit you can muster, one that shows off your bruises, bites and all other marks. 

Arriving at the club you skim your eyes around till they meet Ran’s mischievous ones. You walk over to him and sit on the bar stool next to his, no words are exchanged between you both as you swirl your drink in the glass and tilt your head back to swallow it whole. 

Kakucho and Sanzu watch you closely, admiring the way your skimpy dress hugs against your curves. “Damn.. Who’s she??” The pink haired man wonders out loud. Kakucho looks away, “Haitani’s” Kakucho answers shortly, downing his own shot. Sanzu quirks a brow at him. “Which one? Jellyfish?” Kakucho sighs and looks at Sanzu, “Both of them.”

A/N: I dont think this was stupid or cringe at all, my brother in christ, we shall have a spring wedding, i hope you like this even though i went insane with it <3 luv u 2 ( ˘ ³˘)♥︎, (AND IM SO FUCKING SORRY IM SO LATE)

[rzyraffek]

Yall im bored and i have dol brainrot. Here u go random mostly sfw headcanons. Most of them are just jokes btw don't take this seriously. Beware i am not dol master so If something is inaccurate pls dont crucify me. Request open btw

Includes: what kind of music they lisen, random stuff they do, ect.

I used they/them for both PC and love intrests so some of those sentences were a hell to write

Tw: me going crazy over Avery (i have issues, pls if what I wrote was weird, just close your eyes and idk explode irl idc)

Random DOL headcanons

Kylar

IM FUCKING CONVINCED that this owl plushy that they give to PC has a camera inside. Im not sure if thats mensioned in game AND I didnt see anyone talk about this. But this dude litteraly says "make sure to put it somewhere high so it can protect you/watch you over" (im not 100% sure what they said but it was along those lines)

Wants to have matching black nails with PC

If their heart wouldnt beat so fast everytime PC gets close to them, Kylar acually would OFTEN fall asleep on PC's lap or shoulder (especially in school)

If s/o is afab, Kylar is defnitly into period sex

Had a huge zombie phase and has whole plan (in details) about how and what to do in case of zombie apocalypse acually happening (and they would acually lighten up if PC mensions anything about zombies, Kylar will talk about them whole night!)

Average phonk listener

Sidney

Sometimes wakes up in middle of night after nighmares and wishes PC would be there

High purity sindey will nervously figet with cross-neckace everytime they have lewd thoughts about PC

Overthinker

Sometimes when they pray together he pretends to have eyes closed but they acually look at PC cuz omg love, you look stunning

Watched Barbie with PC (liked it very much)

Lisens to Mitski

Pure Sydney cried after lisening to cupcake songs

Great Hawk

Dude is a simp

Loves when PC has flowers in their hair, and please give them some too!

If PC praises hawk when they give PC expensive objects (jewellery, wallets, purses ect) this harpy guy/gal will call them "little crow"😭 cuz from Hawks perspective thats how it looked like- they find wife, wife sad, they give shiny, wife happy.

(Alr guys this one is a 50/50 cuz im not sure if harpys have hands? Or just wings?) He discovered hand holding and now he wants to hold PC hand all the time!! But his claws sharp so be careful

Likes when PC has colorful hair

Sounds of Forest and other birds (and bird-people) are only sounds he music he needs 🦅

Got scared bcs there was a rock/metal music concert in city and it was loud and he was very upset

Eden

Dude wants to have kids so bad😭😭

Very tall!

If Pc is tiny/short, this guy/gal will pick them up with one hand and just carry PC back to their home

PLEASE kiss their old scars, and complement them! Eden doesnt really like how they look (they are not insecure but they just dont find time to pamper themselfs and look all fancy)

Sometimes wakes up in middle of night with cold sweat and checks if PC is still there

Conteplated if plant people are eatable

Hates deep water

Will say "I dont lisen to music" and then gets judged by PC and me. ( he enjoys some romantic old songs, i guess he likes Micheal Jackson? Maybe the ink spots??Idk)

Avery

Dude just wants to have good reputation😭😭 and nice looking PC

Tbh I would enjoy Avery-dad-figure content😭 like PC just doing all this stuff just to be accepted by some guy that could be their dad😭 their are fatherless afterall😭. Like hear me out PC just craving platonic love from this dude while he just wants to smash😓 (tbh he is not always doing sexuall stuff, sometimes he just vibes)

Pls dude is like 40 wtf is he doing with his life

*in car* "I swear PC if you say anything more about kpop im leaving you in forest"

Lisens to chrismas music😭

Ivory

Dude ate a squirrel once

I wanna cuddle them

Pls they look wet and cold, give them a nice towel and later blanket

Definitely got scared by their own reflection in mirror once

Can talk to animals

Lisens to gothic music

Likes bugs (months, Beatles, bees)

Alex

Dude lisens to Pitbull while working at farm

Picks PC up and throws them on hay piles for fun

Alex and Remy should settle this beef for good, they both should do kahoot about farm animal knowlage and no more "no its my farm not yours!" Bullshit

Watches soap opera when bored

Wears cowboys hats

Ginger

Leninghton

Rizzing up people twice younger than him (hes like 40 or something)

Enjoys board games and omg he loves card games

Hes probably married tbh

Has reddit account😔

The photos he takes in classes? He sells them

He and Bailey should kiss in meat grinder for beating PC ass for no reason🤩😍

[pinkcarnatixns]

ellie williams | the first time, the second time

synopsis rockstar!ellie accidentally injures you and worsens your pining for one another [1.6K] contents rockstar!ellie, tour manager!reader, reader bonks her head, inaccurate portrayal of being a tour manager part two

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚ part one ˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

You felt it since the first time you had met.

When you had first laid eyes on her, you were sure that Ellie Williams would become one of the biggest names in music.

You had met her when she opened for another group you were managing at the time, and you were hooked. The first time you watched her set, you nearly lost your job for spending too much time mesmerized by her and her music.

Behind the stage and with the forced proximity of touring, you two became friendly fast. Every night without fail, Ellie would go out with you and the rest of the crew- even helping to pack everything up. You had always thought it was weird she never made an attempt to follow the headliner around, instead choosing to be squished up against you in shitty bar booths.

When it came to the final dates of tour, Ellie had reverted to blatantly following you around. Many members of the crew had teased you incessantly for it, with you brushing it off as fast friendship. You couldn't deny that you were attracted to her, but she was far too new to the scene and had too much potential to get caught up on some girl she met on her first tour.

Still, you couldn't deny her when she asked to stay in touch in a final act of bravery. You managed to stay in touch for a little while with short conversations in-between your busy schedules. Eventually, these very schedules clashed too much and Ellie became a fond memory of a summer crush as you stopped talking to one another.

You were beyond pleased when you heard one of her songs playing over the gritty speakers of a grocery store, recognizing her voice immediately. Then, you became more puzzled as you kept hearing it between all the stores you visited while doing errands. Pulling out your phone between all of the items you were juggling, you typed her name into google and you were stunned to see countless articles praising a new album of hers, as well as a music video with nearly a million views.

What shocked you even more was a phone call from the very girl painted across your browser, leading you to your current position as her tour manager- only now she was the headliner.

Only a couple dates in, and it had already been one of the most taxing and rewarding experiences of your life. After running between different crew members and carrying heavy equipment all night, you got to watch from the side stage as she sung to thousands of queer girls every night.

If you had a tiny crush on her before, it had morphed into a complete obsession after watching her sing her heart out every night- with a newfound confidence she didn't have when she used to follow you around. With the rise of your affection for her, also grew your embarrassment at even being in her proximity.

Luckily, your duties allowed for easy avoidance of the brunette- you always running off with an excuse of someone needing you fresh on your tongue. Still, Ellie was persistent and had managed to catch you off guard on a couple occasions that only left you a blushing mess.

One of these occurences was fresh in your mind as you once again found yourself stationed at side stage, likely with hearts in your eyes while watching her.

You had been taping schedules up on the dressing room doors, someone blabbering to you from the walkie- your head pounding at the noise. Suddenly the door opened right into your forehead, and you envied the dull throb of your earlier headache.

With your eyes screwed shut in pain and hand flying up to the soon-to-be bump on your forehead, you vaguely registered Ellie's panicked voice. You cracked your eyes open into a squint at her as her hands gently cradled your head, feeling embarrassed for more than one reason now.

"Ohmygod, are you okay?" She rushed the words out all at once and was looking at the spot like it was the greatest shame she had ever witnessed. Her kicked puppy eyes quickly moved down to your eyes as words weren't coming to you.

Unbeknownst to her, you were busy internally patting yourself on the back for hiring the stylist that you did. She was wearing a cropped vest with nothing underneath, giving you full view of her toned, heavily tattooed arms that were at eye level from her delicately holding your head. The deep-V allowed for an almost complete view of her chest, and it took a great amount of strength to drag your eyes back up to hers.

"Oh god," she panicked, "Did I give you a concussion?" Her eyes turned even more worried at your blank stare.

As she whipped around, likely to call for a medic of some sort, you snapped out of it and brought your hands to cover hers, leading them back down in front of you. You swore you felt a breeze from how fast her head came back to you, then down at her hands in your gentle grasp.

You started gently, "Ellie it's fine, you just shocked me 's all."

One of her hands slipped from yours like water as she once again turned her gaze towards your forehead, staring at it contemplatively. Suddenly, she moved closer to you, your heart lurching at the smell of her cologne- she hadn't changed it since that first tour together. You vaguely remember complimenting it once, late at night after too many drinks.

Your breath hitched as she ghosted her fingers over the (likely bruising) spot, gently moving your hair to the side to get a better look. You felt butterflies settle in your stomach between her delicate touch and her warm hand still in yours.

"D'you need some ice?" She whispered into the space between you. She leaned back, and you felt yourself let out a breath you didn't even know you were holding. You mumbled out a no, barely hearing your own voice. Her gaze turned gentle and adoring, but you couldn't find it in yourself to look away despite the hurricane in your chest.

"Wouldn't be able to get anything done without my favorite crew member, Y'know?" She smirked at her comment.

You lightly pushed her away, scoffing and taking a moment of respite from the overwhelming look in her eyes. This motion left your fingers ghosting against the bare skin that her revealing top left, and you brought your hands back like they'd been scorched.

"What would you do without me?" You laughed awkwardly, still avoiding looking at her.

"I dunno, haven't seen much of you lately actually..." she quietly stated.

You slowly turned your head back towards her, racking your brain for some excuse that you hadn't already exasperated. You started about five different thoughts before giving up and whispering a small "I'm sorry."

Her eyes turned wide and she earnestly grabbed the sides of your arms, gripping them like she was scared you would run away. She shook her head a bit, "No, no, no I'm sorry I didn't mean to make you feel guilty... I know you have quite the operation to run."

Once again, you found that all you could do was blankly stare at her- you were expecting her to be mad. She opened her mouth like she wanted to say something more, before stopping. Your eyes met again, with you looking at her quizzically before her face turned resolute and she held your arms even tighter.

"I just begged you to manage this-" her hands left your arms and gestured wildly, "whole thing- because I thought we would get to spend more time together," she blurted out.

You felt your eyes widen and jaw drop, sputtering for words. Ellie looked completely mortified at her confession, and you grabbed the sides of her face to stop her from completely bolting- something she looked very ready to do.

Her freckled face went completely red at your actions, the heat of her hands ghosting over your hips as you both stared at one another. Slowly, you brought her face closer to yours and her eyes softened at the motion. Suddenly, your forgotten walkie crackled to life on your shoulder- shocking the both of you, "10 minutes 'til showtime!"

The volume caused you both to jump away from one another- like you'd been caught doing something bad. Ellie rushed out a 'sorry' before bolting from the room, leaving you stuck in place.

Once you found it in yourself to snap out of your stupor, you exit the room and navigate through all of the equipment and people occupying the backstage area, the background noise turning to fuzz in your ears.

Somebody hands you a mic pack, and you move on autopilot before finding yourself at Ellie's side once again. You both stay completely silent and you pointedly avoid her searing gaze. Instead, you move to her back, fingers dancing over her skin as you secure the mic's clip to her pants.

She stills at the contact, so you move your grip to her hips, rotating her to face you once again while keeping your eyes on the task at hand. She starts to say something, but you grab her hand, placing her in-ears delicately in her palm.

Turning away from her and running to a fellow crew member, you start prattling away the pre-show checklist to your walkie- trying to calm the pounding of your heart and heat of your cheeks.

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

thanks for reading! I'll probably have part two up tomorrow or the next day, and as always, requests are appreciated!!

title is from first time by lucy dacus and pretend this isn't completely inspired by julien baker...

[etheries1015]

As long as you don't mind, maybe Theo, Arthur, Charles and Shakespeare comforting a fem! S/O going through a emotional flashback?(where you feel the old emotions, but it doesn't feel like you're there there; I know for me I get really dissociated during/after and stim nonstop while blasting music to help ground). Only if you're up for it of course and it's something you'd feel comfy writing ❤️ Thank you so much lovely!

Oh my gosh slay my first ikevamp request thank you this is such a good idea!! I hope you don't mind I implemented a scenario I feel would be a relatable emotional experience: somebody brings up your family, friends, or past loved ones, and you can't help but think back at your life before and begin to spiral and question your choices.

Ikemen Vampire x reader - How they comfort you

Featuring: Theo, Arthur, Shakespeare, Charles

TW: Descriptions of disassociation and (very mild) panic attacks.

General warnings: Fem pronouns, not too in-depth but I hope it's still okay!

Theo:

Theo I would say is not particularly the best at comforting, and does it in more of a round about way. However he can't help but need to do something....you're far too distracted while on the job. He had you come along with a few business deals with artists and nobles, and one specific thing a noble had said to you made you begin to think.

"Ah! Theo, and the lovely lady (y/n)! I've heard you have been established as a couple now, correct? Great for you! I'm sure your family must be happy you're with someone as stand up as good old theodorus here, huh?" One of the artists you had the pleasure of meeting blurted out. He hadnt meant anything by it and you knew this, however this was the start of you spiraling. The remaining amount of time you spent out and about with theo involved your eyes wandering to the ground, barely blinking while he led you by holding your hand. Your strides were slow and sluggish, and you had barely spoken a word ever since that incident. Finally you returned back to the mansion after he had finally called it a day, theo practically dragging you to his bedroom.

"What's going on with you hondje?" His eyebrows furrowed, "you've been weird ever since-" he stopped short of his sentence when he noticed tears filling your eyes which were colorless, your body slumping on the bed while you tried to distract yourself from the tears by picking at your nails. You simply shook your head, the words unable to form into coherent sentences thus silence was the best option for you. Theo didnt hesitate to wrap his strong arms around you and immediately begin to rub circles on your back, not pushing you any further to share what was going on.

He was content in the silence with you, he was a patient enough man to allow you to return to yourself in your own terms. Although he was gruff and often seen as outwardly brash and rough, however he knows when to hold back his often difficult attitude. Thus the next hour was him simply holding you in his arms, your light sobs soon evening out as you drifted into a slumber within his strong grasp. After laying you gently upon the bed, Theo made sure to take the following day off, for he knew he must dedicate that time to you.

Arthur:

You had began to make preparations for your wedding with Arthur, one of those things of course being a wedding dress. There were so many to choose from, and on top of being stressed about the whole ordeal and your anxiety creeping in, one of the tailors who were measuring you had nonchalantly said, "Oh dear, your parents must be ecstatic! Now tell me, where are they now? Shouldn't your mother at least be here for you while finding a dress for her precious daughters wedding?" You hesitated before gently responding to her that your mother lived abroad and you communicated by letter, and the woman quickly dropped the topic with a quick apology. The room suddenly felt thick and heavy, your chest tightened as you forced the tears that brimmed your eyes back. It wasn't until you stepped into the mansion after your dress endeavors, quickly rushing past any of the residents without so much as a "Hello." Its not as if you really noticed anyone anyways, your peripheral vision blurred and you felt numb. Any voices you heard drowened out, your mind wandering elsewhere. You wanted to be alone, you wanted to burry your face into your knees and try to cry, to forget the world exists, and fade away. you didnt feel real right now, you didnt feel like...you.

"Love!" You heard a familiar voice break you out or your trance, and panic began to set in.

Oh no.

You began to walk faster, 'don't cry don't cry don't cry don't cry,' you kept telling yourself, 'If I see him, I will definitely cry.' And just as you had suspected, Arthur quickly caught up to you and grabbed your arm gently, a look of concern in his deep blue eyes. Your walls had cracked and the floodgates poured. He immediately pulled you into a tight embrace, swaying with you in his arms from side to side as you sobbed into his chest. Before long he was pulling you into his bedroom, instructing you to lay on his bed. He covered you gently with blankets and had gotten you water (and himself some coffee, of course.) He tried to get you to tell him what was wrong but knows better than to force you to talk. So, instead, he will lie down next to you caressing your hair. Your breathing began to even out, the repeated feeling of his gentle touch had calmed you down. You then spend the next few hours talking out your issues while Arthur peppered your face and jawline with kisses and continued to give you as much support as he possibly could.

Shakespeare:

"Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse thy name. Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love and I'll no longer be a Capulet!"

The familiar line rang in your ears as the play went on, yet another rendition of your boyfriends ever so popular "Romeo and Juliet." However, this time, the words drowned out and you found yourself staring blankly at the stage. You could see blurred lines moving around in act, and words that were being called out as the play continued forward. Yet you were not listening to any of it. Memories of the past had bubbled up into your mind instead, memories of reading Romeo and Juliet for the first time, perhaps studying Shakespeare with your classmates in school, plays that would take place in your world, and faces of people you were once familar with playing those roles. You began to feel numb, devoid of emotions, living in the past without noticing Shakespeare had lay his hand upon your own in obvious concern.

"(Y/n)," he whispered into your ear, "what ails you, my love? Be not afraid to confide in me, let free that in which plagues thy mind," he coaxed. You let out a trembling sigh and simply shook your head in an indication that you had no intention to explain it right now, it wasn't the time or place, nor were you in the right headspace. He let out a slight sigh and rubbed his thumb loving over your knuckles whilst resuming his gaze on the stage, your mind wandering off once again in those memories now turned sour.

Once you had returned home to the villa, Shakespeare attempting to speak to you in the carriage left him feeling uneasy. You seemed far off, looking out of the window while responding in small one-word increments that left him mildly frustrated. Finally unable to contain the annoyance of being brushed off and failing to get you to speak to him, he had decided to grab your wrists and pin you to the bed, his eyes staring into your own with a hint of annoyance along with the overwhelming concern in his furrowed brows. he was about to demand you tell him what was possibly going on, however sudden movement caused you to finally break down, the tears that had been building up poured over and you began to sob. Any sign of annoyance was quickly replaced by pure panic and love, he removed his hands from your wrists immediately and pressed you into his chest. While smoothing your hair down he spoke poems into your ears, trying his best to distract you from whatever was bothering you. An hour went by and he had recited many of the lines from his plays, not even noticing you had ended up falling asleep within his arms... When you awoke you would find yourself comfortably tucked into bed, a cup of tea and little desserts awaiting you with your lover sitting and reading over a script. He wasn't particularly a patient one...however for you, he was willing to do anything to make it all better.

Charles:

You weren't into it this time, the kisses he places along your jawline and hands lovingly caressing your sides didn't leave you shivering in pleasure per usual. You were staring up at the ceiling, eyes void and staring out into space, laying still while your boyfriend halted his sensual advances. He furrowed his eyebrows in concern and lifted his head to reach your gaze as he hovered over you.

"(Y/n)?" Charles asked with a tremble in his voice, "are you...okay? Am I not doing a good job? I'm sorry I-" you interrupted him with a sigh and a shaking hand pressing up against his chest, pushing him gently enough for him to understand to remove himself from on top of you. You sat up with your shoulders slumped over and your hair obscuring your peripheral vision and staring down at your hands.

"I just..." You choked out, "just...remembering some stuff," you said, "don't wanna talk about it..." Your voice was barely above a whisper, yet the lack of animation in your movements and tone had strongly caused Charles to worry. He planted a kiss on the top of your head before removing himself from the bed, putting his shirt back on and buttoning it up.

"Well...then you just rest for now, and I will be back with some food! Food always makes things better," He said with attempted enthusiasm. You had not replied. With a sad smile, Charles kissed your forehead once more before leaving you to your own devices, understanding that you may need some space in order to collect your thoughts and feelings. When he had returned, you had covered yourself with blankets. He tried to resist the urge to set down anything and everything and bombard you with a tight squeeze, instead, he gently lay the food upon the tablet in the room, taking a seat next to you as your light sobs were not gone unnoticed by his ears. Charles removed the blanket from the top of your head, cooing in your ear, "I have food here for you, and tea made fresh by yours truly...would you try it, please?" He asked, puppy eyes to try and lure you out. You simply shook your head. With a defeated sigh Charles resorted to humming a tune and drawing circles on your back, he felt your trembling begin to come to a halt and your breathing evening out.

He knew when you were ready and able to confide in him, he was going to smother you with as much of his love as he possibly could. Perhaps together you could learn to forget both of your worries of the past for a little while...

Bonus: Imagine Mozart just playing piano for you. you're crying softly but he doesn't mind, he just continues to play until it eventually lulls you into a gentle sleep. He isn't good at comforting, but his music can convey how he feels about you.

[kranagok0]

Oh boy, this Is a complete love square....

Guys, I don't know what I have about polyamorous romances but it's like a strange feeling of 'look at that, no one is sad and everyone loves each other.'

That just crossed my mind when I saw the new member of the trio of strange friends (now it's a quartet).

Louise is a breath of fresh air among the extroverts that make up the group.

Louise is practically an introvert. Someone closed who was even the last to be chosen on the boat trip (if we leave aside the trio of protagonists). Louise mentions that she has been in the Sparrow Scouts for some time now but has made almost no friends (or so I think).

I understand what it's like to be an introvert, more or less. I am the type of person who acts with a lot of concern, nervousness and gets serious so as not to say something stupid the first time they meet him... However, when I gain the necessary confidence I transform into someone different. I go from being 'a mouse thinking carefully about its next move' to becoming 'a monkey with a shotgun'. I hope I'm not the only one to have that strange way of being....

My life aside, I'd say Louise is kind of like that too. At first she tries to fit in by being normal with the team, but then she begins to get to know them and identify what things the trio of friends think are right or wrong and that is when Louise begins to show more of her personality. It emerges from the cocoon like a butterfly to show its true colors.

And in short: it is perfect for the trio of friends. It's so weird and different that I feel like it's necessary for the group, and I'm speaking in a positive way when I say weird. A good time.Now the main topic..... Romance.

I've seen a lot of Frida X David, Hilda X Frida, David X Frida fanfics and blogs, there's literally everything. But with the arrival of Louise the combinations are doubled. Now it could be Louise X David, Louise X Hilda, Louise

*Music from a 80's TV game show plays*

Hello ladies, gentlemen and other magical creatures who visualize us! I want to welcome you to this little head-canon idea I had of what each character in the trio of friends would be like if they were Louise's partner!

To do this, we will see the qualities of each suitor and what their dynamic with the character would be like:

Let's start with the one who represents better than anyone the shyness and courage that exists within us, he died twice to try to demonstrate it. Here we have David.

David may be a scary guy, but he will definitely come to save you if you are in danger. This kid would literally show what he's made of on a battlefield if he feels like he needs to prove something.... Don't tell me no, we've all seen the Vikings episode.

Our next contestant is not only smart in school but also in witchcraft. If you ask him about a certain topic, rest assured that when he finishes his talk you will at least have knowledge of the entire topic and its related subtopics. She is willing to do anything for her friends, she would even open a portal to the unknown and create non-existent spells just for you. Let's give a big, fervent wave of applause to the young city witch: FRIDA!

Frida may have been a bit of a perfectionist in the past, but after meeting Hilda and experiencing several events she went from being miss perfect to becoming the smartest friend you can count on. To be honest, sometimes Frida can be a bit boring, but that doesn't stop her from reaching your heart by showing great gifts of her intellect and the magic she possesses means that any topic can arise from a conversation. So, if by 'boring' we mean a lot of context and extremely long topics that she explains to you with excitement and great happiness, then boring is pretty good.

Finally we have the icing on the cake, or in this case the blueberry. Coming from the wild and with more extroverted energy than any of the other candidates mentioned above, we have a young woman with blue hair as long as she could grow it (I don't doubt that she would have let it grow longer if it didn't bother her in her adventures). This girl can literally make friends with almost anything and her circle of friends is huge, ranging from elf scribes to giants who are no longer on this planet. She would be the one to always take the first step in battle with her sword if I see it necessary and— Wait, where did he get that sword?

With you, Hilda!

Seriously, where do I get it from?

Hilda is by far the most outgoing and curious person I have ever seen. Don't you remember what Tofoten was triggered by his curiosity? Dude, it was literally the end of the series. And if you hadn't already noticed, this girl would fight barehanded against a king to save her loved ones. She would be the first to take up weapons to save her friends, she is capable of moving every rock in the entire city to find her pet, she is even capable of doing an act of terrorism just because the bells were bothering her friends.

Oh my god, I'd be afraid of this girl if I were someone who played some practical joke on David in the past or something. I would be locked up at home for what might happen to me. Better confinement than meeting Hilda on the street and having her recognize me.

So.... In a little while we will see Louise's possible choices about who she would like to be with, why I think they would be a good couple and also about what their relationship would be like. And it wouldn't just be from my point of view. Indeed, dear reader, you can also have your opinion. Comment what you think a relationship between Louise and any of our favorite trio of friends would be like.I retire to write incorrect quotes and more about this romance because I am burning with emotion. See you later

[ramrage]

How about another Fortune?

Chapter 1: Part 1

work rating: M

chapter rating: M

relationship: John “Soap” MacTavish x Simon “Ghost” Riley (endgame); John "Soap" MacTavish x Original Female Character (temporary)

characters: John “Soap” MacTavish, Simon “Ghost” Riley”, Original Female Character

tags: Freeform, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Straight? John “Soap” MacTavish, Cheating, Non-Chronological, this is a (gay) lovestory, Self-Discovery

summary: Soap is a heterosexual man in love, and everything is great. Really, it is. Factually speaking, no less.

Enjoy what you have, hope for what you lack. How about another Fortune? SecondFortune.com Lucky Numbers 19, 54, 37, 40, 47, 21

A/N: multimedia, nonchronological weirdness. pardon that. also, it doesn't start that way, but it's a ghostsoap (soapghost?) endgame. fret not.

ao3 link

part 2

John MacTavish with Ella Mitchell

💙

In a relationship with Ella Mitchell

February 14, 2014

67 Likes | 14 comments

Show all comments

Ella Mitchell Congrats, Johnno. Really lucked out with that one :P <3 Like | Reply

PARADISE

Life is good. Can be, rather. So good that you’re drawn out of the moment for a split-second of awe, some shattering clarity of how fucking right things can be sometimes. And then you’re back in it, and somehow it’s even better.

“God, I fucking love you,” John breathes, not a post-nut bout of romanticism, short-lived. There she is: Ella. Sweaty, beautiful, and smiling. Sex on perfect fucking legs, and sweet. So damn sweet. “Fuck, I love you.”

He think it again when she looks away, shy, and looks back again with that wry smile, the one that has him love drunk and stupid every fucking time. “I love you, too, Johnny.”

And then the fucking minx rolls her hips, “but I’ve only cum twice. And you, my dear,” she muses, leaning forward to press a kiss to his cheek “promised me three.”

“Bleeding hell,” John thinks. “I’m gonna marry her. Mother of my future children.”

He makes good on his promise, of course. Lets her take his iPod and play the music she likes as he settles between her thighs afterwards, and throws in another for good measure, because of course. For her, it’s fucking nothing. Anything. Forever, and always, and all that other bullshit.

Time is a pesky bitch, is the thing.

And proximity is one hell of a drug.

HEALTH STATISTICS (UNOFFICIAL)

ORGASMS PER CALENDAR YEAR: 2021

SUBJECT: JOHN MACTAVISH SEX OF SUBJECT: MALE (REPORTED) SEXUAL ORIENTATION OF SUBJECT: HETEROSEXUAL, STRAIGHT

ORGASMS FROM PARTNERED SEXUAL INTERCOURSE

VAGINAL, receiving: N/A VAGINAL, giving: 8 ANAL, receiving: 0 ANAL, giving: 0 ORAL, receiving: 3 MANUAL, non-penetrative: 4 MANUAL, penetrative: 0 TOTAL PARTNERED SEXUAL INTERCOURSE: 15

ORGASMS FROM SELF-STIMULATION

ANAL, manual, non-penetrative: 0 ANAL, manual, penetrative: 0 PHALLIC, manual: 172 PHALLIC, oral: 0 VAGINAL, manual, non-penetrative: N/A VAGINAL, manual, penetrative: N/A NON-GENITAL STIMULATION, manual or oral: 0 TOTAL SELF-STIMULATION: 172

YEAR TOTAL ORGASMS: 187

COMMS TRANSCRIPT

VERDANSK, KASTOVIA 02 11 2022 21:07:33–21:07:38

21:07:33 G: Soap, you’ve got three enemies moving in East. 21:07:36 S: Copy. Permission to engage? 21:07:38 G: Give ‘em hell.

TROUBLE IN PARADISE, PT 1

They aim to call every week, even though they both know more often than not, it’s more of a monthly occasion. But it’s a low key Thursday, and for a change, John actually has time.

“So, how’d it go?” Ella sounds flat and tinny and terribly familiar over the phone. It feels like half the time they speak, her voice is like this. Compressed, still rising and falling with the gesticulations he can’t see, and wrong.

“Good, good…”

He can’t exactly say, “Nah, but don’t worry. The other guy got off much worse. Blew his head clean off his shoulders, actually,” so he tells her everything went well instead. It doesn’t exactly suck, and it isn’t exactly lying. “Yeah,” he continues, “can’t say much, but it was a tight operation. Clean.”

“And that’s why they call you Soap, eh?”

“Pretty and smart. I’ve won the lottery, haven’t I?”

“Mhm. Just gotta come and cash in your winnings is all,” and John’s stomach sinks because the anticipation he should feel is definitely anxiety. Any talk of coming home had slowly and consistently fallen from grace in his mind, and what used to be a respite feels more like faffing about in fairy land. For better or for worse (and in sickness and in health), he is married to his job. Thats how it goes with shit like this: too high-stakes to be anything other than wholly committed to.

Morality aside, two-timing is exhausting business and as John sees it, it just gives you two cakes that you can’t have, and can’t eat either.

PURGATORY

“Happy birthday, Johnny.”

Pulling away from Ghost’s lighter, Soap exhales that first draw, acrid as always, before chuckling. “Aye, cheers. Not how I expected it to go, but…”

“What did you have in mind then, eh? A little pub crawl out here in the middle of nowhere?”

Ghost manages to look nonchalant as he scans the blackdrop forest, leaning into the safe house’s dilapidated siding where he and Soap had posted up not too long ago. There’s bare little to see, bare little to do, so they smoke and shoot the shit.

Happy Birthday, indeed.

“Ha, fair. No point in making plans in this line of work.” He leaves out the part about Ella at home somewhere, filling the bin with pound shop birthday decorations. No use in reusing them. You only turn 30 once, after all. Ghost’s quiet, so he amends, “at least, not personal plans.”

“Had me worried there.”

“C’mon now, the planning is your’s and Price’s domain.”

“Watch it, sergeant. Arsekissing will only get you so far.”

“And how far it’s gotten me.”

“Ungrateful bastard. I got you the candles and everything.”

Soap snorts. “Aye, and you’re always hauling cake, so I reckon I’ve got that, too.”

“Fuckin’ hell.”

Thank god there’s no HR department in Arsefuck, Russia. Soap’d be toast by now. Or maybe not. This isn’t the first time he’s pulled this shit, and the reaction’s just about the same.

“I‘m just sayin’, ‘s not my fault you’re addicted to deadlifts.”

“Fuck—I wanna let you see another birthday, MacTavish, but you’re pushing your luck.”

“So you do like me.”

TROUBLE IN PARADISE, PT 2

“Hey, good-lookin’. How does this sound? You, me, a little takeaway, maybe a movie?”

John glances up from his phone. “What?”

“I was wondering how you felt about a night in.” Ella groans, noticing John’s eyes are still glued to his phone. A couple of snaps in his face, and John finally looks up. “I’m sorry,” she begins before he has a chance to apologize. “Am I interrupting something?”

John shakes his head. “Baby, no. Fuck, I’m sorry. It’s fucking work shite, shouldn’t take me too much longer.”

Ella doesn’t look appeased. Not remotely. Eyes burning mad above the dark circles, fingers tapping testily where they rest on the waistband of her joggers.

“How many times are ya gonna be sorry, John, eh?” Exasperated, she runs a hand through her brown hair, messing it up even more than it already is. “You’re gone for months on end, and that’s fine. I knew that was what I was getting into. But then when you’re actually fucking here, you couldn’t give a damn.”

“Elle, c’mon, don’t say that. I promise I want to deal with this shit even less than you do. You know I care, ba—”

“I don’t know that I fucking do, John. I don’t know that, and honestly, I don’t know if you really do care.”

John’s since put down the phone, but stands to wrap Ella in a gentle, rocking hug. She only fights him for a second before slumping against his chest. He likes it here, likes resting his chin on her shoulder where he can smell the lavender of her shampoo and her unwashed sleep shirt.

“Ellie, my darling. Give me five more minutes and I’m all yours. Put the order in on my card, and we can crack open the nice wine in the coat closet.”

“Dinner and drinks won’t just make it better, John,” she protests, muffled and half-hearted.

He leans back just enough to catch Ella’s eye, “No, it doesn’t.”

He jerks his head to the side, indicating she ought to let his hands guide her, turning until she’s facing away. She sighs and curses “that fucking MacTavish charm” when he starts kneading at her small shoulders. “That’s why I’m also planning on giving you a massage,” he begins to her answering hum, “a long one, and when you finally feel nice and relaxed and pampered, we can play that game you’re so fond of.”

“Which game?” she quips back despite knowing already what he means.

“Well, all you have to do is sit back and look pretty and let me see how many times I can get you off.”

“Mm, right, that one.”

“So, how does that sound for a night in?”

2022 PORNHUB WRAPPED

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HELL, UPPER CIRCLES

“Alright, fuck, get the fuck off me.”

Ghost relents and rocks back on his haunches, offering a hand to help Johnny roll to sit cross-legged. “You’re getting better.”

“Fuck off,” Johnny pants.

“Stronger, yeah. But smarter.”

“I’m plenty smart as is.”

“Weren’t always. Ya used to run in headlong, make stupid mistakes. You still do, granted, but not as often.”

“If that’s so, how’d I end up flat on my arse?”

Ghost shrugs, scratches the back of his neck through his damp mask. “I’m better.”

“Cocky bastard.”

“Takes one to know one.”

Soap rolls his eyes, wincing as he pushes himself up to stand. He squeezes a long stream of water into his mouth, missing near half of it before chucking Ghost’s water bottle across the gym.

He feels neither pleased nor surprised when Ghost turns the other way to lift his mask and drink. It’s what Ghost does.

“Five minutes and we go again,” Soap says, because it’s just enough time to catch his breath, “and this time, I’m fucking pinning you.”

“Fat fucking chance, sergeant.”

Enjoy what you have, hope for what you lack.

How about another Fortune?

SecondFortune.com

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(link to part 2)

[kraftwerk113]

Life´s too short for weird music – 2022 Pop music – „Small world full of D4TA“

Wie kann ich den den musikalischen Jahrgang 2022 in kurzen Worten zusammenfassen? Der Jahrgang, welcher im noch kurzen Jahrzehnt der Zweitausendzwanziger sicherlich der beste seien dürfte und dies obgleich die „Corona-Jahrgänge 20 und 21 sicherlich nicht enttäuschten. Ein allgemeiner Trend, den ich seit 2019 beobachte: wieder mehr Qualität, sowohl in der Spitze, als auch in der Breite der neuen Veröffentlichungen und dies insbesondere im Jahre 2022. Einmal mehr hatte ich große Mühe, die im zurückliegenden Kalenderjahr als Tagestipp vorgestellten „neuen“ Veröffentlichungen (291 an der Zahl) in eine Top 100 zu pressen. Allein der exorbitant hohe Anteil an neuen Songs bei den Jahresempfehlungen 2022 ist ein deutlicher Indikator für die hohe Qualität des Jahrgangs 2022.

Ein bisschen wie ein roter Faden durch das Jahr zog sich, dass in 2022 viele Acts mit neuen Veröffentlichungen hervorstachen, die ich als langfristige Wegbegleiter meiner Reisen durch das bunte Popuniversum bezeichnen möchte. Angefangen bei Metronomy und Everything Everything, über Alt J und Hot Chip, bis hin zu Moderat, die nach 6 jähriger Pause ein rauschendes Comeback mit dem Album More D4TA hinlegten. Das großartigste weil so nicht zu erwartende Comeback gelang in 2022 aber den Eighties- Ikonen Tears For Fears, die 18 (!) Jahre nach dem letzten Album Everybody loves a happy ending gloreich mit The tipping point zurückkehrten. Überhaupt war 2022 auch – und das ist eine erfreuliche Trendwende – gekennzeichnet von vielen guten Veröffentlichungen im Albumformat: Raw Data Feel(Everything Everything), Asphalt Meadows (Death Cab for Cutie) und Two (Dubstar) um nur einige zu nennen.

Der wichtigste aber nicht beste in 2022 veröffentlichte Track– wie ein Blick auf die folgende Top 100 schnell verrät – kommt von den Techno/Electro Urgesteinen Orbital, die zusammen mit den unwiderstehlichen Sleaford Mods das Genre des Agit-Pop im Song Dirty Rats wiederbeleben konnten. Selten konnten Sie besser zu einer derartig kritischen politischen Abrechnung – insbesondere Bezogen auf die aktuelle Situation in GB – abtanzen. Sicherlich die beste Veröffentlichung dieses Genres seit Heaven 17s (We don´t needthat) Fascist groove thang.

Die Geschichte der Top 100 (die Kurzen) ist schnell erzählt: Vier Platzierungen für Everything Everything (die auch bei den Top 20 (die Langen) den Spitzenplatz einnehmen), ebenfalls vierfach in den Top 100 vertreten: Hot Chip, Moderat und Death Cab for Cutie. Über allem thront aber der beste Song des Jahres, der in 2022 von Joseph Mounts illusterer Combo Metronomy stammt: Love factory – auf der Suche nach dem perfekten Popsong ist Joseph Mount mit Love Factory schon wieder einen beachtlichen Schritt vorangekommen.

Überraschend für mich, dass auch das klassische Popsongformat in 2022 deutlich zulegen konnte, was durchaus gelungene Veröffentlichungen von Harry Styles – vor Jahresfrist noch unvorstellbar im Kontext von Life´s too short for weird music -, Elton John (with Britney Spears!) und Taylor Swift belegen.

Und natürlich darf ein Blick auf die deutsche Popmusik-Szenerie in 2022 nicht fehlen: Und zumindest in drei Fällen vermag ich Positives zu vermelden: neben dem alles überstrahlenden Comeback von Moderat konnte auch die „halbe“ Neuauflage von Propaganda – als xPropaganda - mit dem Album The heart is strange überzeugen. Und was sich bereits in 2020 angedeutet hatte: das Trio Sparkling darf weiterhin als größte deutsche Nachwuchshoffnung gelten. Bleibt zu hoffen, dass Sparkling der Single The right place in 2023 endlich das langerwartete Debüt-Album folgen lassen.

Und schon sind wir in Mitten der Life´s too short Top 100 für 2022 die sich wie folgt gestalten:

Die Kurzen (Life´s too short for weird music Song Top 100 of 2022)

Metronomy / Love factory

Everything Everything / I want a love like this

Porij / Finger skating

Orbital /Dirty Rat (feat. Sleaford Mods)

Death Cab for Cutie / Pepper

Everything Everything / Jennifer

Metronomy / Things will be fine

Hot Chip / Broken

Moderat / Doom Hype

Dubstar / Token

Röyksopp / Impossible (feat. Alison Goldfrapp)

Fontaines DC / Roman Holiday

Superorganism / On and on

Belle and Sebastien / Reclaim the night

Death Cab for Cutie / Fragments from the decade

Tears For Fears / Break the man

Beach House / Only you know

The Orielles / The Room

Bicep / Water

Real lies / Dream on

Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs / Blood in the snow

Hot Chip / Eleanor

Sylvan Esso / Didn´t care

Harry Styles / Satellite

Gorillaz / New Gold (feat Tame Impala)

The National / Weird goodbyes (feat Bon Iver)

Daniel Avery / Chaos Energy (feat Kelly Lee Owens/HAAi)

Porij / Automatic

Alt J / Philadelphia

Yeah Yeah Yeahs / Wolf

Yuné Pinku / Affection

Orlando Weeks / Bigger

Phoenix / Alpha Zulu

Hot Chip / Down

Foals / 2 am

George FitzGerald / Rainbow and Dreams

Metronomy / Right on time

Death Cab for Cutie / Here to forever

Moderat / Easy Pray

Kae Tempest / More pressure

Hayden Thorpe / Golden ratio (feat Deep Throat Choir)

Beach House / Once twice melody

Sparkling / Not the right place

Moderat / Neon Rats

Suns signature / Golden air

LCD Soundsystem / New body rhumba

Disclosure / Waterfall

Two door cinema club / Everybody´s cool

Pale Blue Eyes / Little gem

Neu! / Hallogallo (Stephen Morris and Gabe Gurnsey Remix)

Skeleten / No drones in the afterlife

Dubstar / Lighthouse

Jamie XX / Kill DEM

George FitzGerald / Cold

Alwonation / Eye in the sky (feat Beck)

Cruel Sister / Chihiro

Hibou / Night Fell

De Luxe / New Summers

Working men´s club /Ploys

Everything Everything / Teletype

Pale Blue Eyes / Star vehicle

Day Wave / Looner

Röyksopp / The Night (feat Alison Goldfrapp)

Totally Enormous Exstinct Dinosaurs / Forever

Lambchop / Police Dog Blues

Real Lies / Ultraviolet

Taylor Swift / Carolina

Hot Chip / Miss the bliss

Telemen / Short life

Everything Everything / Bad Friday

Godford / Say my name (M.J. Coles Remix)

Porij / Lose our minds

Yuné Pinku / Bluff

Kae Tempest / Don´t you everything

Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever / Blue Eye Lake

Death Cab for Cutie / Asphalt meadows

Fujiya and Miyagi / Digital hangover

Iron Curtis and Johannes Albert / Something unique (feat Zoot Woman)

Moscowmen / I contort myself

STR4TA / Lazy Days (feat Emma Jean Thackrey)

Leftfield / Full way round (feat Grian Chatters)

Warpaint / Champion

Fujiya and Miyagi / Slight variations

George FitzGerald / Passed Tense (feat Panda Bear)

Sunbeam Soundmachine / Two summers

Moderat / More Love

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard / Magenta mountain

Björk / Ovule

Rheinzand / Love games

Orlando Weeks / Deep down ways out

Flasher / Sideways

Bicep / Meli II

Panda Bear and Sonic Boom / Edge of the Edge

Ladytron / City of Angels

Alt J / The Actor (Ben de Vries Remix)

Dayglow / Then it all goes away

Gorillaz / Cracker Island (feat Thundercat)

Frou Frou / A new kind of love (Demo)

Boxed in / Take me to you (feat Yuné Pinku)

Elodie Gervaise / IMYG

Die Langen (Life´s too short for weird music Album Top Twenty 2022)

Everything Everything / Raw Data Feel

Metronomy / Small world

Death Cab for Cutie / Asphalt meadows

Hot Chip / Freakout Release

Moderat / More D4TA

Dubstar / Two

Beach House / Once twice melody

Belle and Sebastien / A bit of precious

Real lies / Lad Ash

XPropaganda / The heart st strange

Orlando Weeks / Hop up

12. Tears For Fears / The tipping point

Fountaines DC / Skinty Fa

George FitzGerald / Stellar Drifting

Phoenix / Alpha Zulu

Lambchop / The Bible

Björk / Fossora

The Orielles / The Room

Pale Blue Eyes / Souveniers

Superorganism / World wide Pop

[dispatchvampire]

Radio Free Bucky - Bucky x Fem!OC

Pairing: Bucky x OC (in progress)

Warnings: Fluff, mild angst, casual swearing, smut in later chapters

Series Summary: A bunch of interrelated  of fluffy ficlets about Bucky and Penelope. Strangers in the night, tenuously connected by the past, finding their way together a little at a time.

Chapter Summary: In which Bucky has a birthday and someone unexpected knows about it.

It was his birthday, but he’d kept the proceedings low key. Dinner with Sam and his family, some cake, before retiring to the fixer-upper he’d bought not far from their family homestead so he had a place to stay in Delacroix  that wasn’t the front room couch when he came down. That’s really all he had the mental and emotional space for these days.

The soft patter of rain on the roof and windows droned in the background as he worked on the birdhouse Sarah had asked him to. Sam’s sister was a sweetheart, very unlike her brother, and he had no problem giving in to any and all requests from her and her boys. They did love them some Uncle Bucky. 

A memory of a warm summer afternoon on the bayou made him smile as Chet Baker’s smooth voice crooned about falling in love too easily, just a shade louder than the downpour. As much as Sam gave him shit for it, Bucky liked what he liked, and he wasn’t ashamed. It was good music. 

He’d found this satellite radio station one day online, looking for god knows what now, but it had been a revelation. A whole channel devoted to 40’s music, and it was like the universe was giving him a bit of comfort after kicking the hell out of him for so long. 

The soulful trumpet at the end of the song faded into the gathering shadows in his workshop.

“That was Chet Baker on vocals and trumpet there, and I think that might be my favorite song of his. It’s ten past eight here on the east coast, and this is 40s Junction.” 

Just hearing her voice made Bucky smile. It was warm, knowing, with a spark of humor that made him wonder if her actual smile was as nice as what he pictured in his head. And, to be fair, he’d pictured her a bit.  

This woman, the only female DJ at the station near as he could tell, was a nightly companion as he worked on his projects and unwound at the end of the day. Hearing tiny snippets of her life, and how joyfully she related to the music that was clearly way too old to be current for her, made him feel a little less alone in the world. It was an unusual feeling and he’d started to enjoy it. 

“Now, I know I promised you all I’d get to some Ella Fitzgerald this hour, but…” she trailed off and he turned his head to look at his phone like he expected to see her there, with a mischievous grin. “I wanted to take a moment to share something with you all. Today’s a special day in my family. It’s a tradition my Pawpaw started way back in 1945.

“I’m sure you all have guessed by now that he’s the reason I’m here with you, five nights a week from four to midnight. He was my best friend growing up and I miss him terribly. 

He served in the Army in Italy, with the 107th Infantry Regiment.” Bucky carefully set his work aside as his fingers went numb. 

“You history buffs probably recognize the unit, but for those that don't, that’s Captain America’s outfit, and my grandfather was Gabe Jones, one of the original Howling Commandos. 

“Today is March 10th, the birthday of one of my Pawpaw’s fallen comrades in arms, Bucky Barnes. For years, on this day, he’d raise a glass and tell us about the man who saved his life more than once. A man who gave him a reason to go on, to keep fighting, even when all seemed hopeless. Whose death marked his young life indelibly. You get the picture. 

“He’d raise a glass and ask us to remember the fallen and their families, and to help those still around us carry on. After the Blip, I’m sure a lot of us can relate to those sentiments.” Her sigh held paragraphs he didn’t need a translation for. 

“Anyway, long story short, it feels weird to say that Bucky isn’t dead, as Pawpaw informed us, but I’m celebrating his day just the same. I’d like to think he’s having a good 107th birthday, out there, somewhere. 

“As for me, I raise a glass to him, and all the boys who served.” She paused and he could faintly make out the sounds of ice cubes hitting glass. “And with an extra sip for those who didn’t make it home. Happy Birthday, Sergeant Barnes, wherever you are. Now, here’s Ella, serving up some Black Coffee.” 

Bucky’s gasp when the music kicked back in told him that at some point he’d lost air, and even though he was breaking currently, the lump in his throat was throttling him slowly. Of all the things… so many thoughts in his head, fragments of memories, imaginings. Abandoning his workbench entirely, he shuffled across the room to toss himself down onto the couch in the now mostly-dark. 

He could see Gabe’s face in his mind like it was yesterday. Easy smile, quick wit, brilliant mind. Gabriel Jones had been a good man, and it warmed Bucky’s heart to know he’d gone on to come home, have a family, and that he kept the joy in his life. 

The tender affection in her voice when she spoke of her grandfather said more than any words could ever. That was the true measure of a man, the love of those left behind.

There was a voice in his head, one that sounded annoyingly like Dr. Rainor’s, whispering that he was well-remembered by those he’d left behind too, and that meant something. To them, to the world. It was a voice quickly snuffed out by the knowledge that while that may have been true at the time, a whole encyclopedia of lifetimes had transpired between then and now, and his worthiness of that sentiment, no matter how well-intended, well… it was more worn than not. 

Still, it warmed his heart a little to know that he was thought of fondly, and by his DJ-crush of all people, even if it was a strange coincidence. How could it not? He may have still been getting used to this time, but having that moment, that connection no matter how brief, felt like a much-needed hug in a world that has offered him precious little in the way of comfort. 

For a second, he could just close his eyes in the gathering darkness and let the music and rain rhythm wash over him, like a baptism of time, washing him clean once more. For a second, he could just… be. And it was enough

[person4924]

new about me

my name is sam !! thats basically all u need to know but theres (a lot) more under the cut!!

i’m probably bi (i’m too tired to think about it anymore) and ace

u can use any pronouns but she or they !! (this is my pronouns page)

i’m neurodivergent of some sort (i don’t even know anymore)

a minor (don’t be weird)

my personality type is INFP-T

my theme will change like weekly prob bc i wanna change it with every new huperfxation i have!!

things i like (the things bolder r what i talk about the most)

harry potter (fuck jkr)

marvel

the marauders

boy meets world

it

osemanverse

paper girls

teen wolf

owl house

shameless

glee

stranger things

friends

andi mack

the last of us (i’ve only watched the show tho, but i know most of what happens in the games)

riordanverse

musicals

poetry

reading

cats

animals

fictional characters

music

movies

tv shows

art

writing

women

sitcoms

brooklyn nine nine

new girl

hamilton

grishaverse

stand up comedians

ocean animals (specifically sharks)

community

moths (and just kinda winged bugs in general)

greek mythology

dawsons creek

bojack horseman

halloween

the sky (like stars, the moon, the sunset, etc)

jelly fish

criminal minds

animals

ted lasso

scooby doo (the older movies from the 2000’s ish specifically but all of it too)

everything sucks!

the sun bearer trials

atypical

octonauts

spencer reid

bo burnham

dead boy detectives

will and grace

my fav movies are tick tick boom, my girl, dead poets society, breakfast club, the outsiders, hamilton, stand by me, cmbyn, lady bird, beautiful boy, luca, nimona, (500) days of summer, etc. i have a lot but this is just the first few i think of

musicals i like are hamilton, tick tick boom and the greatest showman

my fav taylor albums are folklore, evermore, reputation, 1989 and speak now but i love all of them really (please please ask me abt them omg)

my current hyper fixation is the marauders (more of a life-long obsession atp) and criminal minds and shameless. my soul is being torn apart.

i’m currently reading turtles all the way down or rereading tpobaw i haven’t decided

my fav music people (i’m really just giving a short list of many): conan gray, cavetown, current joys, queen, rainbow kitten surprise, the front bottoms, harry styles, noah kahan, taylor swift, phoebe bridgers, the fray, coldplay, olivia rodrigo, billie eilish, boygenius, gracie abrams, sufjan stevens, maya hawke, the smiths, lucy dacus, julien baker, the smiths, sleeping at last, mitski, bo burnham

i mostly post about whatever hyperfixation and/or character/person/ship has overtaken my brain, music and analysis things

i appreciate tone tags and i try to use them as much as possible

i’m always looking to talk to more people and i’m always bored (don’t be weird istg)

my fav books are any alice oseman book, the outsiders, the perks of being a wallflower, i fell in love with hope

child of athena (i think, idk how to actually figure it out)

biggest pandalily shipper you’ll find

i love love love making character analysis’ or song or movie or tv show or books or ships or whatever

i also write sometimes!! (i suck ass)

and i’m person4924 on ao3 but i can’t figure out how to link it

this is my spotify (my character playlists are my pride and joy and reason for living. i also have the best music taste you will ever encounter.)

this is my discord

this is my airbuds idk if anyone actually uses it but i thought it’d be fun to share music with mooties

please please please send me asks i have no hobbies or friends and im always bored please please please (im on my hands and knees begging please please please)

i have a tagging system!! idk how much ill remember to use it but yeah!! (its also new so only my new posts will have them) #sam shut the fuck up -> any original posts that don’t fit in any of the other tags #asks!!! -> asks #polls!!! -> polls #crazy? i was crazy once -> headcanons for characters/analyis things

[authortobenamedlater]

S2 deep dive. The whole season. Bring the scuba gear for this one.

Negatives, positives, overall impressions, speculations about a possible S3 under the cut.

This has been sitting in my drafts for way too long and even though it’s incomplete I’m posting it. I’ll have more later I’m sure I just need it out there before it becomes irrelevant.

The bad:

It’s too short. I have pontificated about short TV seasons and long waits between seasons before so I won’t revisit it.

The fall of Reach felt more like a speed bump than the single most traumatic event in the Human-Covenant War. This is probably related to the It’s Too Short problem.

This one is entirely subjective, but I am here for The Chief & Cortana Show and this season was not The Chief & Cortana Show.

Much of the unfinished business from S1 remained unfinished or was finished lazily. The Reach for Life Project and the weirdness surrounding John’s childhood? Never mentioned. Madrigal? Glassed. Separating John and Cortana? Reduced to a one-minute flashback. This isn’t to say these threads won’t get picked up down the line, but having to potentially wait another two years doesn’t appeal. Again, this goes back to It’s Too Short.

The Spartan-IIIs made little sense. And why were they capturing kids if they can use adults to make Spartans now? Are there enough left to make up a Spartan corps?

Somehow, Makee returned. This isn’t bad in itself, but it’s never explained. The closest we get is Var saying “you live only by my grace.” OK, what grace is that? Did he resurrect her? Convince the prophets to resurrect her?

Speaking of Var, why did he exist? To make way for Thel next season? Why not just have Thel from the start? Especially since deleted dialogue from S1 had that Sangheili who ran out of the cave on Madrigal named as Thel ‘Vadamee.

Jacob Keyes is dead. It’s somewhat canon, but I didn’t want it to happen. I wanted him to live and face his music.

I did not like what they did with Soren this season. The Kessler storyline got draggy. And the way Soren acted at times didn’t really seem in line with the guy in S1 who made a promise to John and kept it even though he could probably have broken it without John ever knowing. Soren also gave the impression in S1 that he didn’t want anything to do with fighting a war and just wanted to hole up on the Rubble with his family. That changed in S2 without any real reason given.

They still can’t figure out Kwan. I liked the direction they were taking her last season, but that all got blown up, literally.

The Spartan-IIIs seemed awfully rushed. We don’t know anything about them, if or how they are augmented, or what.

The good:

Halo’s cast continues to rise above the show’s shortcomings, and the crowning achievement this season is Joseph Morgan’s Ackerson. Morgan manages to make Ackerson the bad guy, but never a bad guy. You love to hate him and want him to realize he’s wrong just in time to make that last-second pivot and then he does.

Laera might not be back for S3 (although hey, somehow Makee returned), but she got some great material this year.

For all its flaws, Halo does have a way of sticking the landing and the final episode of this season delivers. The introduction of the Flood was about as great as I could have asked for. That scene where the no-name bit part gets infected and the ironically happy music is playing while everyone goes about their business? Appropriately horrifying.

I liked Talia’s progression from jumpy regular Marine to confident Spartan-III, even if the show didn’t have enough time to do it well.

Makee and John continue to have a fascinating dynamic.

The back and forth with John and Guilty Spark (I assume) in the last episode was excellent and did a fine job setting the stage for season 3.

The big question: Will we get a third season?

Nothing is guaranteed in the era of streaming shows, but Halo has been P+’s most watched show since it launched. It’s been the third most watched original show in the US across all streaming platforms this year. Basically, no matter how terrible the show is sometimes or how much fan hate it gets, Halo is making money. I can’t see it not getting renewed. If Halo didn’t get renewed, another network might want it, or P+ might do a spinoff (thoughts on that at a later date).

[intoloopin]

A CHAPTER: THE SHARP AND THE BLUNT (PART 1/2).

tw(s): panic attack. dubious consent (haruki is very weird and forward about initiating sex!). alcohol abuse & alcoholism. semi-smut? (there is making out). miscommunication (a warning because I personally think it's constant and frustrating). insinuation and direct discussions of sexual trauma, abuse by a past partner, abuse of workplace power and stalking. internalized homophobia (in part one, a hint). If I missed anything, please tell me! starring: Lee Hanjae. Fukunaga Haruki. featuring: Dylan Hwang / Hwang Chihoon. Their fellow LOOPiN members (old OT10, no Gyujin, a lot of Beomseok). Delilah Franco. Oh Sunyoung. Choi Sangwon. Blonde Bob Piss Girl (a serious character).

timeline: quick flashback to 2018 | early to the end of mid 2022.

word count: 13,405 words. author's notes: welcome everyone to hanruki fuckery part 1 a.k.a the most frustrating and life draining four months in Hanjae's whole entire life a.k.a big sadness, the piece split into two. this one is over 23K long, and was originally intended to be read in one go but! It Got Too Big. The conclusion will be coming out later this week! prepare for a Haruki all in par with the one in the prologue, which falls in between this mess on the timeline. this is a work of a whole month, but it's also a work of two years: a whole central plot, planned and done. title's from this song! give it a listen once you get trought the bigger picture, maybe, for catharsis purposes. stay safe! remember you deserve to be safe, always!

November 12, 2018.

Hanjae had vowed not to cry anymore when he got this job – in the same vehement way he had promised at twelve that he would no longer make a sound if he wailed after school, face buried under piles and piles of unfinished homework, to medium success, just the right amount of it to call it success.

He could still tear up once in a while, if things got though, and that was it; a clause added after his first exhausting week as a trainee. The number escalated to once every two business days after he was shoved to debut on LOOPiN, out of all the upcoming boy groups there were.

There was a story taunting the New Wave Music corridors back then. Someone did something unspeakable to someone else, and it caused an expulsion, followed by the immediate need for a new rapper, a new dancer. And there was Hanjae; a BBC trainee for three months, far removed from the Boy Of The Week gossip, who couldn’t exactly sing but had great enunciation, and had been dancing before he was even walking…

He cried now, openly, defeated. It had been an awful day for LOOPiN 2on1.

Their short lived promotions had played out like a sunset: a big golden start – so much press, so much momentum, so many views on the ‘Baby Don’t Stop’ dance practice video, where he and Haruki were using plain shirts and even plainer jeans – quickly diluting into the darkest of times – the controversies, LOOPiN first ones, and exclusively about them.

A resurrected Facebook photo of Hanjae on his graduation with a bandage around his hand, matched with the lingering traces of his poorly removed tattoo there painted him as a school delinquent; Haruki’s drop out stories reintroduced him as the big drunken failure of KArts’s international program.

They were going to stop going to music shows, the company had decided that day, and Sangwon told them on the drive back that they had just done their last one. They had gone up on stage as a duo for the last last time.

With a strong sniff, Hanjae unburied his face from in between his knees and looked at his hand, at the faint shape of a badly drawn rose on his skin. His dad had been adamant about getting it out the moment he took a look at it, still involved in protective plastic. He used the little money off his college safe to arrange a laser session that Hanjae skipped. A year later, Hanjae managed to schedule another one with the partial sponsor of MBN, the company he was stuck on before BBC. He had to do it in a shady place, at a bigger cost: bad skin scarring.

His mom had been relieved to see it fade even more nonetheless, up until the black tattoo turned into something that almost looked like a peculiar and old scar, if you didn’t give it a second glance; and no one was ever giving Hanjae a second glance.

“Let that be a lesson,” she told him, nose turned up and away from him. “Don’t jump head on into things again, Lee Hanjae. That’s no way to live. Watch yourself, watch your company. You’re not a kid anymore. Do you have no goals? Do you want nothing for yourself? Are you that selfish? Can’t you think, for once, about something that isn’t–”

Haruki was the one who found him, sitting on the floor, small and tense against the laundry machine, waiting for everyone’s clothes to be cleaned – the member’s, Sangwon’s, the cleaning auntie's aprons she had forgotten on top of the dinner table last week. Cleaning was always his scapegoat way of attending to something, even if very small.

Maybe if the company decided to drop him, he thought, Hanjae could still be around as the dorm’s janitor.

“So you’re not from Seoul,” Haruki said, leaning against the door frame with an air of mischief around him, something light on his step despite it all.

It was a statement, not an ask, because he knew this. It was one of the few trivia points they had exchanged during pauses on music shows or water breaks in between choreography practice – ‘What’s your age? What’s your blood type? How many siblings? Oh, none? You’re so lucky, Hanjae, so lucky. All siblings are demons. You aren’t missing a thing.’

Hanjae didn’t even startle; Haruki often popped up at places like that, picking up conversations from days, weeks ago like they were merely put on pause.

Without uttering a word and barely looking up, he still nodded his head no.

Haruki nodded back, a pacifying smile showing up on his face, said, “Cool. Great. How about I show you a place?”

‘The place’, he informed Hanjae, was not all that nice, or clean, and he really shouldn’t wear nice shoes or nice clothes tonight, but at least it wasn’t far, at least they had permission.

“Who’s permission?” Hanjae asked, taking the pile of clothes to the dryer, smoothing wrinkles off them just for something to do.

Haruki waved manager Choi’s front keys in his hand, and Sangwon’s horrendous keychains clanked against each other: a green pine tree and a colorful ball. “The one that matters. What do you say, uh? You’re in? Can I count you in?”

He could count Hanjae in.

[...]

They stopped by a convenience store on the way, some couple of blocks down the dorm, and by then night had already conquered all of Seoul. Inside, the middle aged lady behind the counter rushed to give Haruki a hug, a paper bag and a discount.

“He’s a street cat I found,” she leaned in to explain when she caught Hanjae anxiously looking at him going straight to the back of the store, near the freezers, near the alcohol, with the ease of someone who could do so with his eyes shut. “He’s a good foreign friend.”

“I’m not!” Haruki shouted back, but he was grinning. “Are you not watching the news?”

The noona playfully rolled her eyes, joked back, “What news? You’re not on the news!”

She hushed Hanjae to go catch up with him with an enerved wave, told him to take a look around. “It’s on the house,” she winked. “You’re both so skinny, and you must be working hard, so just take something tasty and leave quickly.”

Trailing a couple feet behind Haruki on the aisle, Hanjae picked up a package of noodles and a modest four-set of Terra cans to accompany his endless Heineken bottles, light green on light green. While Hanjae bagged everything with caution, Haruki slipped a red won note on the balcony when the owner stopped paying attention to them, and off they went again.

Haruki made them walk ten more minutes to the left, and the left, the left again, coming to an abrupt stop in front of an abandoned lot, pure dirt and weeds, the sort that seemed to have turned into an open dump for the neighborhood. It looked no different or less disgusting than the million of others around less central Jungnang; it didn’t look like it could be a spot.

Yet Haruki kept braving straight through the grass without stopping, guiding Hanjae behind him to only step where he was stepping, to keep his eyes glued to the floor and watch out for broken glass. He settled when they were deep into the lot, mere feet away from a big hill. There was a clean view of an uneven street if you looked down, he said, filled with houses that were almost all pretty. Hanjae chose to just trust Haruki’s word on that; he couldn’t dare to come close enough to the drop to peek and see.

Haruki standed the bag of drinks for him to hold, and Hanjae had to do so with both hands. From a spot behind them, he pushed two retriable chairs out of a bulk set against a moldy tree, the metal in them corrupted by rust on the edges, and set them up, sat down, tapped at the other seat with his foot in invitation.

Hanjae took a long and anxious moment to comply. Under him, the chair dangled sideways even if he stayed very, very still.

With the convenience bag back in his domain, Haruki cracked three beers open, and handed Hanjae one, kept the other two: one in each hand, a Heineken and a Terra.

“Never had this one. I heard they’re the same thing,” he said, taking a sip from each and frowning, analyzing them. Hanjae stayed quiet.

He had only drank with his dad and uncles one time, at last year’s Chuseok, and hadn’t been much of a fan of anything. Still, he took a sip of beer.

Haruki at least had grace enough to let him swallow and contain a grimace before asking, with a strange edge to it, “So are you? A bully. A problem child. Part of a gang.”

“No,” Hanjae said, too quickly, too eager. He cleared his throat. “I’m really not, hyung, no.”

“How did it get there, then?” Haruki's look was razor sharp on Hanjae’s once tattooed hand, hard enough to make him freeze. “And why did you remove it? Just to be a trainee?”

Hanjae opened his mouth, but only to take a shaky breath in, swallow a bit more of bitter alcohol. In front of his fleeting eyes, Haruki eased just as quickly as he had hardened.

“Hanjae, we’re teammates now,” he told him. “I showed you my good spot. You can’t give me one word sentences anymore. You can’t lie.”

Hanjae considered this, and considered him from the corner of his eyes. Haruki was the LOOPiN member that Hanjae had come to know best, mostly because they didn’t have a choice, but still, he made an effort, he talked to him; he didn’t let Hanjae fall adrift. And he could have easily turned into an island: from the moment he had been transferred to New Wave, he had been an outsider, a last minute solution to a problem no one would explain to him – who left? Why? Was he worse than them? Was he better?

“You’re better,” Haruki had said, when Hanjae brought it up, late at night while they had dinner alone, in the practice room, sweating and panting – a week until their debut happened. He was the only one who had bothered to tell him so. He sounded like he meant it, too. Hanjae remembers catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror over his shoulder, hair bright brown and unfamiliar, thinking even for a fleeting moment: I’m doing enough.

It was fair for him to be the first to know – the first for Hanjae to disappoint.

“I got it removed before,” he heard himself say. It was a secret, so it came out like one: whispered, slow. “Before I wanted to train. I got it with friends– my dance crew friends. It was our logo, or at least, it was going to be, one day. But I… I did a bad thing, and it stopped making sense. It didn’t fit. I didn’t fit, so. It had to go.”

The vagueness did nothing but pique Haruki’s interest. He seated more properly, then less properly; ended up putting his feet on the seat of the chair, slouching with his head supported on his knee, the exact body language of, ‘Tell me, tell me, tell me.’

“My friend– my best friend, from childhood, our team captain. He used to have a girlfriend. A girl from our class, a dancer too, someone he had been in love with forever. Later she became part of the group, and we got close, we turned into friends, and then not. Not quite that. They broke up and one hour later we got together, on the same day. We got caught. It was a mess. Everyone thought it was a shitty thing to do, that it was cheating, cheating on everyone. But I just wanted her to be my girlfriend, back then– Back then, I wanted a girlfriend more than I wanted anything...”

Hanjae felt it coming, again: the desire to recoil a bit more on himself in shame. How pathetic he had been, then; how miserable, how sad, how lonely.

He took a timid peek to the side, ready to see an irk of dismay on Haruki’s face, some justified disgust, and was surprised to not see any of that. Haruki had grown passionate and invested in the whole story, something new in his eyes, a third bottle halfway drained in his hand.

He moved his chin up, as if saying, ‘Go on’, but Hanjae couldn’t. He drained the rest of the beer.

Haruki clicked his tongue like that wouldn’t do. He shoved his chair a few inches closer so he could grab at Hanjae's arm and said, all at once, “We can not– Hanjae, look, listen, we can not be blamed for all the things, the crazy things we do when love…!” He didn't finish the sentence, just amended it into another one: “You were a teenager, you both were, and very, very brave. Very brave to tell her and date her and keep dating her even if. They were just– bad friends. Just bad friends.”

They weren’t bad friends, Hanjae knew; they weren’t the ones in the wrong. But it hurted to say it out loud, to admit what he knew was still true: how easily he burned bridges for attention, for affection, so he never did. He just knew – looked at his reflection on surfaces and knew.

He rolled and rolled the tap of the Terra until it fell off, into the can. “Did you really quit college, hyung?” Was what he asked the wind.

Haruki shifted on his seat; Hanjae could only tell because of the way it creaked. “More like college quit me,” he said, with a sad huff of air that might have been a laugh, and dropped Hanjae’s arm, drank from his bottle too.

Sadness fell over them like a veil from then on. The Terras ended and Haruki didn’t mind sharing all the other stuff he had, and the longer it went on the less shy Hanjae felt about asking. At some point Haruki said, “I guess we really fucked up, uh – with 2on1,” and Hanjae, whipping a foam mustache off his face, “Minwoo’s not talking to me,” and Haruki, almost falling over with laugher, “Oh, my, I bet not! Ha. I bet not…”, and turned reticent, fell quiet.

His eyes, Hanjae had noticed, kept darting to a spot ahead in between conversation, beyond the drop of the hill, dazed. He violently shook his head sideways everytime he caught himself drifting too far away, and ran a hand over his face, rubbing at it in a way that made Hanjae look at him in worry.

Haruki found it hilarious each time. “What is it,” he eventually said, slower than normal, harder to understand, “With you, your face?”

He got up from his chair, a sudden move that sent it falling to the floor, a loud squeak, and walked even closer.

In front of Hanjae, right in front of him, he leaned forward until he got both his hands on his face, and said, pushing the corners of his mouth up, “The mood is so– Bad! So bad! Smile! Big smile! C’mon, give me a big smile!”

There had been dirt on Haruki’s hand, and Hanjae could vaguely taste it, with how close to his lips he was pressing. He still wore his inner braces back then; he kept cutting his tongue on the same spot, never healing, never telling, and he could feel the inside of his cheeks pressing onto that sharp place, about to be pierced through.

For a moment, they stayed quiet, looking at each other head on. Hanjae was not smiling. His heart had picked up a quick pace inside his chest, was drumming – Haruki was so close, and he was so beautiful, a true magazine type beauty, all symmetry, and Hanjae knew this, but not with this much conviction, not with so much emotion.

“Ah, you know what? I like you. I decided. I do like you, now…” Haruki said, and then he grinned, bringing his face even nearer. He took a breath and Hanjae felt it on his own nose, and didn’t know what to do about it; his mind, for a moment, went static. “Nothing will happen to you, friend. I promise it. ‘Will not let it.”

Hanjae’s held breath was a painful thing to let out of his chest. “Was something– Was something going to…?”

Haruki huffed a laugh and gave his cheeks two playful taps, said, with a new found determination, “Handsome guy. Do not get sad. I will fix this for you,” and let Hanjae’s face go.

He straightened his back up and swayed slightly to the side, running a hand over his hair, fixing his bangs back into place. Haruki told him, “Late. No booze. Night over”, and extended that same hand for Hanjae to take – Hanjae who still felt like his face had gone numb, blood rushing to it.

He took the hand, and they made their way back to the dorm that way, hanging close; Like magnets, Hanjae remembers thinking, idly, and then not idly at all. Haruki’s hands were leaving behind a pressure everywhere they touched, a heat that Hanjae couldn’t shake off – he just couldn’t shake it off.

Later, when Hanjae layed in bed, sheet drawn over his entire body, he could still feel it. When he woke up the morning after, nauseated but still in the group, still safe, he could still feel it.

If he closes his eyes now, right now, he can still feel it – the sad sort of burn of a premonition misread.

January 13, 2022.

Los Angeles is sunny in a way Haegon would love to see and pretend to hate – a saddening thought Hanjae had since they landed, and that comes back to haunt him while he looks at the city passing by on the van’s window, sidewalks all golden.

Haegon’s not a loud person in his eyes, but his absence is a loud thing, pouring the life out of everyone, mostly because of the way it had been forced on them.

It had been a horrifying way to open the year: having to come forward right on the first day of 2022 to the press, headlining Haegon’s mugging and the accident, his follow up hiatus and excuse out of their ‘We Do’ promotions in the USA. And then there was having to deal with Haegon in private, angry and disappointed, not wanting to take his pain medicine, shoving his room’s door in everyone's faces, dismissing every checkup attempt with an annoyed, “It’s just a minor concussion, what the Hell! I’m not fucking dying! Get the fuck off me, I’m fine, get off, just fuck off already to the States without me! Go on! Just– just leave me already!”

They’re driving out of some media company studio around the center of Los Angeles, where they filmed two twenty minute videos in a roll, more embarrassing games than actual interviews, and Hanjae has already spent all of his ability to mend English words together.

It could have been more fun, one of their staff said, but they had to pass on the puppy interview format because of Taesong’s allergies, and Jiahang’s been dead set on pretending to be sad about it during the entire ride back to the hotel; crocodile tears and all.

Hanjae has to deal with him from the last seat on the far opposite side of the van, resting his fried blonde head against his shoulder, sighing loudly, because Dylan is also not here to amuse him – he took a bus home to Santa Monica and will stay home until they leave in two days time.

Hanjae doesn’t like provoking Taesong, doesn’t like to spoil Jiahang, but that means very little in the grand escape of the group, that goes about poking fun of Taeng like it’s a sport, that’s stuck in a position where they really can’t say no to J.J, who owns company shares; he shoots the meek figure of Taesong an apologetic look as Jiahang’s act carries on, trying to tell him: ‘I’m not a part of this, I just don’t know how to stop it.’

Thankfully, the hotel isn’t that far away, and it’s a quick torture – up until things takes a turn for the worse.

As they park and start to step out, Beomseok’s long arm blocks the door before he and Jiahang can put a single leg outside of the car.

“Stop,” he tells J.J, harsh enough to make Hanjae stumble a step back. Beomseok points a finger right at Jiahang’s face, and inch from touching his nose, says, “Stop being a fucking problem. Stop.”

It makes Jiahang livid, turns his ears bright red. He takes long stomps to the elevator, and Hanjae has to jog to keep up with him – Jiahang really has the longest legs Hanjae has ever seen on a person.

“He’s got such a stick up his ass!” He keeps on saying, barging into the room they’re both sharing with Dylan and Zhiming – angrily tossing his bag into his ‘cheap dollar store bed with the cheap dollar store sheets’ that made him go into a very similar rant last night. “He thinks he’s the only one who cares about Gon, the only one who can bother. He’s so wrong. I’m fucking worried too! I’m calling him too! I miss him! I’m more of a friend to him than that weirdo is. He’s so weird. He thinks he owns Haegon and everyone and everything, just because he’s older, just because he trained for like, one billion years! Like it’s my fault Starship thought he was too ugly to join NO.MERCY!”

“You were being annoying, Jiahang,” O.z deadpans from the corner he’s tucked in, without looking up from his manhwa.

Jiahang grunts louder. “Yeah, that was the point. Taesong knows I’m just joking around! Everyone knows!”

Zhiming lowers the comic from his face, flipping a page. His eyes have deep dark circles behind his thick glasses, marks that never go away. “Unnecessary.”

Jiahang rolls his eyes, putting his hair up on an ugly bun. He turns his back to Zhiming’s bed and mouths at Hanjae, mocking, ‘Unnecessary’.

Hanjae shrugs at him, and that annoys J.J too. He angrily puts on a movie on the tiny TV, gets a hold of his bed’s pillow and wraps himself around it, mumbling something under his breath still. The tags on the streaming app read comedy, musical. He chews on a poor nail while humming along the first song, and Hanjae tries to humor him with a tiny, “Is that Ariana Grande sunbaenim?”

It doesn’t work. Jiahang shoves his face into his pillow and says, miserable and muffled, “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t hang around with you, you’re so lame. I miss Dylan so much.”

“He invited you to go with him,” Hanjae says, helplessly. “You said you didn’t want to.”

“Of course I didn’t want to! I would have to sleep on the floor. In a bag, on the floor. And I don’t think his grandma would like me – I don’t think anyone in his family would like me,” he turns his face around, off the pillow. Hanjae can hear clearly when he says, “He needs time alone with them. For the anxieties.”

“The anxieties?” Hanjae asks him, very slowly.

Jiahang presses his mouth shut tight, straights himself up again. He undoes his ponytail, tosses his long, long hair from one side to the other, behind his ears.

He takes a quick look at Zhiming, and Hanjae does too, and they go by uncaught; O.z’s got his big headphones in now, eyes glued to his comic book.

Jiahang is still careful to whisper, “The rest of you don’t get what it's like, when you’re away from your home every day, when you know all the people you’re going to see aren’t all the ones you know – when you got family that’s like, old, and you know that time’s passing. You’re losing days with them. It gets scary, after a while. Dylan’s grandad will be 82 this year, hyung – that’s a terrifying number, that’s a maybe. That’s the anxiety. Mine, his– Zhiming’s, too. Foreign member anxiety.”

Hanjae nods, sharp. Jiahang makes a face at him, brighter – smiles, says like a tease, “Not Haruki’s, though. Haruki doesn’t miss Japan at all, if that’s what you’re wondering. He’s not anxious about that.”

Hanjae blinks. Opens his mouth, closes it, blinks again. “I wasn’t going to ask–” 

“Sure thing. Suuuuure,” J.J says slyly, and goes back to watching TV, and Hanjae does too. Gulps, keeps looking at the movie, tries to pay attention.

Jiahang put on korean subtitles for him, yet he keeps talking – explaining everything. It’s a nice enough movie, he says. Good songs, nice enough movie.

They’re reaching the end of it, seeing every main character gather in a protest around town, when Haruki barges into their room.

“Are any of you not gonna rot inside this hotel?” He asks, loudly, quickly. “Is anyone going to do anything? Catch some sun?”

“Hanjae’s supposed to be going out,” Zhiming tells him. He’s also watching the movie now, has Jiahang by his side, explaining to him what he missed.

“Oh?” Haruki says, and looks around the room, eyes a little clouded, until they land on Hanjae. He smiles, and it stretches across his face quick and big, like he’s actually glad to see him, like the effect is instantaneous. Hanjae can’t for the life of him look at it head on. “Perfect. That’s just perfect, I’m going with you, Hanhan, just wait for me to get changed!”

“Okay,” Hanjae says, and hops off the bed too quickly, sits back down. “I– Waiting.”

Immediately after Haruki leaves Jiahang gives him a long look over Zhiming’s shoulder, and Hanjae pretends not to see it.

“You’re too easy,” he says, with a disapproving nod of his head, and Hanjae pretends he doesn’t hear it, pretends it doesn’t sting.

It’s humiliating, being reminded that people know – that they look at him and know, and he’s reminded of it constantly.

“Hanjae’s sad, sad bisexual awakening,” was how Jiahang put it, sing-a-song in the studio, while making this very single they’re promoting now. “Worse, worse than Minwoo’s– Is that a verse? Can we put that on a song, on the album?”

Minwoo said, for the two of them, “Fuck you.”

And there that one time, the one he remembers clearly, when Seo CEO said he wanted to sit down to watch them practicing ‘Love Me Right’ before the big release, and Taesong pushed Hanjae aside, told him, “Hanjae, you– if you need to check the choreo, please look at the instruction video. Don’t look at Haruki like that, there’s no need to look like you–”

There had to be a separation, he realized; he had to get it under control.

So Hanjae made friends with the people Haruki seemed to not stand, which sometimes meant everyone, but mostly meant J.J and Beomseok – two extremes of very opposite lines. He’s built a line of separation, wrapped himself up in Haruki repellent, and he tries to live by it.

It’s a frail line, a shitty line, and it comes crashing down all the time, with the little moments; single minutes where things feel kind between them, different. A bottle of water and a perfectly folded towel passed to him backstage, a group conversation where Haruki eventually says, like clockwork, “And you, Hanjae? What do you think?”; no one else says that. There’s this lingering nearness coming from him, like there's always something Haruki wants to say or do but can’t, something he wants to check.

It makes Hanjae wonder – makes him come back to that one friendly night, hang on to it. The way Haruki had been so near, his exact tone of voice when he said that he liked him, considered him a friend, thought he was handsome, was going to fix whatever was wrong.

[...]

“So what are we doing?” Haruki asks when they step onto the sidewalk.

“Just filming my Loop Log,” Hanjae responds. “Deadline’s tonight.”

“Shit, that,” Haruki groans, taking his cap off to push hair out of his eyes, putting it on again. “I forgot all about that. ‘Haven’t filmed mine either. ‘Think I lost my camera.”

“I can help you look,” Hanjae offers. “When we get home.”

“Well, thank you,” Haruki says, and steps closer, slides an arm over Hanjae’s shoulder, tells him, “For now, I guess we’ll just have to stick tight. LOOPiN 2on1, reunited in L.A…!”

At Hanjae’s timid request, Chihoon made him a list of what he should get to ‘live his best tourist life’, what the fans might want to see him try: pancakes, bacon and eggs, ice cream, anything in the menu that looks like it could have come off a cartoon, any ‘house specials’.

They go into the nearest place listed with the camera on hand, and have to explain with their Frankenstein English that they want to make a vlog, can they make a vlog? They can, a waiter says, but only in a specific area; they get taken there.

Hanjae orders the house special, and it's a crazy looking Banana Split. Haruki settles for waffles, and they decide to start filming when the food arrives.

Any chance of small talk between them goes fully stall when Hanjae asks, right at their waiter steps away, as the opening topic: “Have you talked to Haegon?”

Haruki’s dangling hand on the table stills. He smiles weird, notices it looks weird, drops it: “Ah, no. No…” and goes silent, makes Hanjae go silent too.

The food comes, they start filming. Hanjae’s meticulously trying to extract a tiny piece of strawberry from a block of ice cream, all while only looking through the camera’s lens, when Haruki’s phone jumps to life, ringing.

He takes it out of his pocket, places it screen flat on the table without looking at the receiver once, mutes it with one hand, adds a mountain of maple syrup to his food with the other.

“Not important,” Haruki reassures Hanjae when he catches him looking at the buzzing phone, an inch away from falling off the edge. He forks the food and stands his hand across the table, says, with his Idol voice, “Wanna try?”

It’s good sweet food, all of it. The camera goes back and forth between them, hand to hand. Haruki makes him pretend they’re shooting a commercial, at some point, makes him do a different pose with every bite, and Hanjae tries to not lose control of his face with all the wooing, all the praise.

It’s fanservice, and Haruki’s good at it. It makes for good content. Everything: good.

Outside, bill paid, they take shelter from the sun and check the recording; thirty raw minutes of footage.

“Hanjae,” Haruki says, looking up after skimming the video, solemn. Hanjae leans a bit forward, eyes a little wide.“The Log will turn out very boring if this is all we do.”

It is, indeed, not the best vlog Hanjae’s ever made. Not that he’s ever been any good at them, or at anything on the media side of the job outside of music covers or choreography making. He’s seen the views on his solo variety content, Sangwon walked him through them all last month, said: nothing special.

They barely talked in 30 minutes – Hanjae didn't initiate a single conversation with him.

Quickly, Haruki’s eyes narrow as he scans the area around them, and Hanjae tries to keep up. He looks for a long moment at the barracks of food, at a man selling balloons, and finally lands far ahead, on a group of kids running on the sand. The leading one trips on air and falls face first on the ground, immediately wails, and they let out matching startled, horrified laughs.

Haruki jogs until he’s in front of him, and turns to walk backwards, closer to where the sidewalk gives into the beach.

“You wanna do that?” He arches a perfect eyebrow. “Run around on the beach with me. Like we’re in a movie.”

Hanjae steps on a stone, lands his other feet on the ground wrong. “I– No.”

“No? Well, I’m doing it! It’s what the vlog’s missing! Trust me, if we do this, it’ll fix everything,” he says, and before Hanjae can even think of what to reply, turns around and starts running on the sand, straight ahead.

Haruki’s already bent over near the ocean when Hanjae catches up with him, folding his jeans until they stop at his knees, barefoot. He insists: “Let’s go, let’s do it, you’re already here, it’s going to be fun, the fans will like it, let’s do it, let’s do it!”

With a resigned sigh, Hanjae unties his sneakers.

Haruki approaches a family nearby and asks for a beach chair, gets a yes. They place the camera cautiously on it, set it with a big zoom ahead. Haruki leaves his phone there, too, with a careless toss, and Hanjae can hear it announcing another call as he steps away, trailing exactly behind him – footprint over footprint, back near the ocean and then on the ocean.

“I thought– Hyung, I thought we were going to just walk,” Hanjae says, stopping. The salt water is a chill foam around his foot.

“Yeah,” Haruki flashes him a smile over his shoulder. He’s about to be knees deep, is taking his Hawaiian shirt off, Hanjae realizes now, with a flush. “We’re walking. Into the water.”

Hanjae catches the shirt when he throws it over his shoulder, looks at it, up at him. He takes a step closer. “Manager Choi’s– Haruki, he’s going to complain!”

“Fuck him!” Haruki tells him with a laugh. He says, with meaning: “Fuck him, fuck New Wave, let them complain, I’m going for a dive and no one can stop me!”

And then he dives, swims, disappears under the water for a long moment. Hanjae stays planted where he is, at a loss of words. When Haruki reemerges, pushing a curtain off black hair off his eyes, and walks back splashing water at him. By the time they’re side by side again, it looks like Hanjae took a dive, too.

“Are you…” He starts to say, eyeing Haruki worryingly, but then the family from before calls back to them, says they’re leaving, they need the chair back, and Haruki claps him on the shoulder, smiles widely, races him to reach them.

“Look,” Haruki says when they’re checking the footage, back on the sidewalk, showing Hanjae a clip: the two of them, a little blurry, walking. “We even got your good smile.”

“My good smile?” Hanjae echoes.

“Not to imply you have a bad one, because you don’t have a bad one,” Haruki says, and bumps their shoulders together. He has just put his shirt back on, is wearing it unbuttoned. “You just have one that’s relaxed, easy. A rare one.”

“Hm,” Hanjae responds, looking away, rolling a rock under his feet.

The walk back to the hotel is calm, windy. The sky’s cotton candy pink and it all looks like a movie, Hanjae thinks. He looks down, and their hands are loose, hanging close, like it would be in a movie.

The end credits roll when they get in the hotel’s lobby, and find Sangwon there – just right there. He catches sight of them immediately, like an alert dog; a quick jump off his seat, a stall near.

He seems to consider them like an equation, frowning: he takes in their wet hair, the wet clothes, the leftover traces of sand, solves it, fumes.

“Do you have any idea,” he says, and he’s struggling to look at the two of them, to not just gawk at Haruki – to not bare his teeth to Haruki only. “Any idea, you two, of how irresponsible this whole stunt was? You’re out on a foreign land. You know no one – no one. When I– The company, if the company calls, you pick your phone. It’s how it works. Pick your phone, immediately.”

Hanjae checks his own phone, a quick glance: no calls.

“Choi-nim,” he says, not looking directly at him, because he lost the ability over the years. Sangwon’s gaze now makes him incredibly anxious. He takes the camera out of where its hanging around his neck, stands it. “I notified– On the calendar, I added– We were just filming–”

“No need to explain, Hanjae,” Haruki interrupts, and puts a hand on Hanjae’s shoulder, steps in front of him, puts himself between him and Sangwon. “Go up. You did nothing wrong. It’s okay. Hyung’s going to solve this with the manager.” He turns straight to Choi-nim and bows, so pristine, so polite: “I take full responsibility for today. It was all me. I’m really sorry if I caused you stress.”

Sangwon considers him for a long moment, taking in the bend of his elbows, like he’s trying to measure his sincerity – there’s almost none of it, Hanjae can tell. He sighs, and then he adjusts his shirt, picks at the cufflinks of his uniform, breaths – his nostrils taking over his entire face.

“You’re dismissed,” Sangwon tells Hanjae, icely, with a corner of the eye glance.

“Sir, I–”

“Dismissed.”

“Go on,” Haruki encourages him, giving Hanjae’s shoulder a firm tap. And then he runs a hand over Hanjae’s hair, messes it up until his wet bangs are glued to his forehead, which he’s never done before; not with him, not with anyone, as far as Hanjae’s aware.

Hesitantly, Hanjae steps away, goes to take the elevator. He keeps looking at them over his shoulder, watching them trail away with growing uneasiness. Haruki keeps looking back at him until he can’t: Sangwon gets the door of the hotel open, shoves him by the shoulder out.

Up in his hotel room, Hanjae showers for a long time. There’s sand on a spot on his elbow where Haruki gave him a tap, and it takes him a while to notice.

He comes off the shower and goes straight to laying down. Zhiming, who had been awake when he came in, is also in his bed now, fully still.

He turns over once, and then again, goes back on his side. “Zhiming hyung?” Hanjae whispers. “You’re awake?”

When Zhiming finally responds, it’s with a minimal grunt, a tiny quick of his socked foot. “What.”

“Do you,” Hanjae chews on the words, “Do you think I have a good smile?”

A pause, a loud sigh. “You’re an Idol. You should hope so.”

“Okay. Okay, so what about– What about me do you think, what looks bad?”

Slowly, very slowly, Zhiming raises his upper body on his elbows. His air is a mess, recently dyed from gray to black too quickly. Without his glasses, he’s forced to squint at Hanjae, even this close, with their beds separated by a very narrow space.

“What the fuck are you even talking about?”

Hanjae takes in a sharp breath, and nods – puts a hand over his eyes, nods again. Stupid, so stupid.

“Nothing,” He says. “Nothing, just– Forget it. I’m sorry, just– Sorry.”

Zhiming goes back to laying down with a loud ‘oof’. He says, a crude whisper, “Don’t go out alone with him if it’ll make you come back like that.”

And with that Hanjae decides he must sleep, immediately, and end this day already.

It was just a day, he tells himself, rubbing at the scarred spot on his hand; a flower in eternal bloom, once. Just one good day. Drop it, forget it, erase it.

February 15, 2022.

“C’mon, you guys, c’moooon! On a scale of one to ten–”

“Na Seungsoo,” Minwoo’s voice rings out like a warning; an elastic pulled far above its limit, about to snap back into place, hard. “Shut your goddamn mouth.”

“She’s right there,” Haegon adds, equally as ultraged. “Are you dumb? Do you want to die?”

“Light up, you two. We’re just talking hypotheticals. I’m not actually gonna fuck our mananger,” Seungsoo says, crossing his arms, raising his chin high – his posture the embodiment of a practical joke about to take action. “That would be desperate and unprofessional, and I am none of these things.”

“You’re extremely unprofessional,” Jiahang laughs at him, a little mean – all his laughs have something a little mean about them, Hanjae can’t help but notice, when Seungsoo’s involved. “And extremely desperate. You just fucked our sound assistant. We no longer have a sound assistant, because you fucked her.”

“So did Jimin!”

“A fluke,” Zhiming defends himself. “Not happening again.”

“It’s never a fluke with you, Seungsoo. You’re such a man whore. A man whore for staff. Even Sangwon could have pulled you when he was around if he had a pair of tits,” Haegon notes, and Seungsoo gasps, mutters, scandalized, ‘You bastard!’, raises a fist up as if he’s going to hit him, and everyone’s laughing. Hanjae contributes with a grimace. “You’re that gross, you’re really that disgusting, all it would take–”

Behind them, Dylan begins to violently choke on a bite out of his granola bar, hard enough for the whole photo studio to freeze.

Taesong stands up immediately to check on him, and so does Jungwha, their three day old manager, Choi Sangwon’s definitive substitute and the topic of Seungsoo’s most recent infatuation: she rushes forward to aid alongside an assistant, a cup of water materialized out of thin air on her hand, like a trained lifeguard.

It’s too early for any of them to get a good read on her, but Hanjae has working eyes, so he will admit Junghwa is good looking in a mature sort of way, a bit above the ‘K-Pop staff adequate’. She’s not far from Seungsoo’s type, given the fact that he pretty much doesn’t have one. Hanjae has seen him flirt with Seo CEO’s third ex-wife, the second ex-wife, all of Minwoo’s half sisters and, in a disastrous attempt, Dylan’s mom. ("She's just so young, Chihoon! I thought she was your cousin!"

"I don't have a single cousin and you know that! You went for my mom, you animal, the least you can do is own it!")

“Holy shit, Chihoon,” Seungsoo says, tapping him on the back with one hand, fanning him with the other. “You’re alright?”

“My bad– False alarm, guys, my bad–!”, Dylan mutters, still coughing, watery eyes quick in their attempt to scan the room for something, someone.

Hanjae follows their frantic trail until they land on the quiet figure of Haruki by the coffee machine, his back to them, shoulders rigid and on display – wearing the same suit outfit Hanjae has been put on, his in a shade more close to purple than blue.

It fits Haruki splendidly, as must things do.

“Alright, boys, hey, boys!” Jungwha calls out when Dylan’s lungs go back to normal, clapping her hands one loud time. “Break’s over! It’s the real deal, now! So let’s try to have a good day at work today! Fighting!”

They’re set to scatter in trios and duos, the old unit formations, except for Haegon, who’s still on hiatus, still has stitches all over the crown of his head. He only made it because Haruki insisted, and he’s always insisting, lately: “How can we do well without our cheerleader,” he told Haegon in the morning, “Our cute, adorable cheerleader, my very favorite little brother–!”

“Hi,” Hanjae mutters, tapping Haruki gently in the shoulder. Haruki jumps, catching his breath, and Hanjae drops his hand, shoves it behind his own back. “Ah, sorry, if I– I was just going to say we should–”

But Haruki is turning and splinting in front of him before all the words are out, growing out of earshot, out of hold, entering a hallway on the left.

Hanjae, embarrassed, follows.

They’re supposed to go to room 4, but Haruki walks right past it. Hanjae calls back to him from the door, says, “Hyung, that’s not the–”, and then his voice falters, dies out.

Haruki’s already quick pace has grown even quicker, and he’s now running towards the door at the end of the corridor, the one with a red sign written ‘TERRACE’ over it – really running, to the point his body almost slams against the metal when he stops. The door handle makes a loud noise as he tries to push it open, can’t make it, tries again, harder – manages to step out with a strong shove. Hanjae goes after him, frowning, worried.

Outside, the terrace is a gray space, almost the same tone as the sky – rain’s a strong promise on the horizon, a reasonable fear.

Haruki’s standing right at the center. He tries to take in a big and loud gulp of air, can’t, makes a choking sound, lets out a hiss. Hanjae can feel the acute panic coming off him like electricity, gluing itself to his very own skin. He reminds himself to breathe.

Haruki stands an arm out and that’s the distance between them, that’s the nearest he’ll let Hanjae get.

“What’s– What’s happening, what’s wrong, what–?”

“Just,” he’s trembling bad. “Leave, I need– Leave.”

“Now?” Hanjae asks, and he’s making himself bite down on the trail of: ‘But the shoot’, ‘But the gig’, ‘But the job’ so hard, he’s actually got his teeth sinking on his lip.

Haruki nods, sharp and final, and Hanjae feels himself nodding back, frenetic. “Okay, stay– stay here, okay, you’ll leave– we’re leaving, just stay here.”

Hanjae walks back into the building with his head very low, tries to not walk too quickly to bring attention to himself, feels like he’s falling; feels like the whole world is looking at him. He holds his breath while sneaking back into the room they’re using as a closet, picks his and Haruki’s things like a thief: pushing everything into their bags without folding, eyes anxiously looking behind his back, flinching at every outside noise coming through the door.

Haruki’s phone is the last thing he grabs. He only becomes aware of it because it starts ringing. He looks at the screen, a quick run of his eyes. The contact name reads: ‘Don’t Answer Don’t Answer Don’t Answer.’

On the roof, Haruki’s sitting on the floor, resting his forehead against the wall. The back half of an air conditioner hangs close to him, and the leftover water pools near his feet, turning the hem of his pants dark.

They put on the yellow raincoats, plastic hood all the way up, and make a clumsy escape out the studio; Hanjae babbles something at the receptionist about there being equipment in the van, and the woman gives them a distracted ‘go ahead’ nod, an empty courtesy smile.

They walk without a plan, enter on the first bus that stops close: Haruki on the lead, completely reticent, Hanjae only following. There’s still a trail of glitter going down his neck, shiny with sweat, red from stress, Hanjae notices when they sit down. He’s still crying, still whipping at his runny nose with the expensive fabric of his shirt.

Hanjae looks down at his own clothes, the suit vest with no shirt under, a design piece New Wave doesn’t own – he’s wearing eyeliner, a strong smokey eye. They look expensive, and to an outsider, probably peculiar, weird. They don’t even have masks on…

Maybe, Hanjae hopes, trying to hold on to any trail of optimism possible, they could pass as very dedicated cover dancers, maybe–

The sound of Hanjae’s phone ringing makes them both jump in their seats. Haruki comes out of his state of anxious inertia to put a hand on his knee, pressing on it to get his attention. He says, through his teeth, “Do not– Hanjae, do not.”

Hanjae lets the phone ring out. He looks at the receiver: Uhm Junghwa (Manager).

Haruki’s peeking at it too. “Off,” he says, and it’s off.

It’s raining when they step out of the bus. They get maybe five feet down the sidewalk when a phone rings again – this time, Haruki’s. He comes to a sudden halt, and Hanjae bumps into his back and gets a close view of how, in an act of blind rage, he throws it hard on the floor.

“Fuck!” Haruki says, and steps on it once, twice, cracks the screen then the whole device in half. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

Hanjae looks at him, wide eyed, mouth hanging open, and watches him pace around, a tense moment, until he loses all steam, goes sit by the closest wall.

Haruki stays for a long time there, one hand gripping the fence, the other pressing over his face, being rained on. Cautiously, Hanjae slides his raincoat off, squats down, close to him, and stands it over both their heads. Rain drips directly into his shoulder, makes a cold path down his neck.

“I hope your–,” a hiccup, a sniff, a faint and unconvincing attempt from Haruki of laughing them both off, “your fantasy’s still– still up.”

“My…?”

“Can you not,” Haruki says, a hiss, “Not look.”

Hanjae complies, doesn’t look. Behind them, a car runs close to the sidewalk, splashes a wave of rainwater on their backs.

“Sasaeng?” Hanjae tries, “Is it a sasaeng, or…”

Haruki lets out a bitter snort. “Imja,” he says, and it makes more sense that he means ‘owner’ rather than ‘marriage partner’; Hanjae can’t hear anything else, can’t connect anything else to something he knows and decode it.

His throat has gone dry, sandy. He clears it, and still, his voice comes off clipped. “Your…? Ah. Ah, I didn’t know– Didn’t know you have someone you were–”

“You know him,” Haruki says. “For years. You– you’ve known him. He gave you your job– Made your job happen.”

It takes a long moment for it to click, for the shape of manager Choi to come to Hanjae’s mind. Haruki’s looking at him like he’s expecting Hanjae to do something horrible: mouth set for a fight, eyes so red they look like they’ve been painted over.

“Hyung,” Hanjae breathes. His voice is an even quieter thing, afraid. “Do you mean– Are you being serious?”

“Am I! Am I serious?!”

He’s up again, quick – Hanjae loses his equilibrium and falls back on the street. Haruki doesn’t wait for him to get up to resume stomping.

It takes two street turns for Hanjae to understand they’re detouring from the dorms.

They sit on another bus stop bench, hop on another bus. A quiet and tense drive, this one. Haruki’s no longer crying, just grinding his teeth.

They go to the front gates of a tiny building, their final destination, and Haruki tells the security guard an apartment number, wais to be buzzed in. He does soon, and Hanjae, yet to be told to leave, goes up with him on the stairs.

Delilah gets the door he bangs on, and Hanjae’s stuck blinking at the sight of her, who shouldn’t still be in Korea. Haruki barges into her place like a hurricane: shoes still on, pushing her a little back, closer to the wall.

They both stare at the spot he occupied on the corridor a second ago, a held breath.

She recovers much quicker than he does. Deh tucks a long lock of her caramel hair behind her ear, greets him with an awkward, “Hanjae, hi. Hi...”, and Hanjae gets overwhelmed by too many things at once; how glad he is to see her, the shame of how they had parted. Her sad face when she told everyone she couldn’t stand to work with them anymore.

“You’re back.”

“I am! I am back!” Deh says. “How could I not! Europe’s too gray for me. The food’s too bad, and...” She sucks air through her teeth, takes an anxious look behind her, back inside. “... And all that.”

Hanjae shakes his head, agrees – agrees to all that even though he has no idea what all that is. There’s a pool of spit on his mouth, and he has to concentrate on gulping it down, has to try more than once.

“Hanjae, baby, look– I’ll send him on his way later. Maybe tonight. Or tomorrow morning. Just…” She trials off. “Please don’t tell the others we met, okay? I don’t want Seungsoo looking for me or asking around. I don’t want to see him again, ever.”

Fair, Hanjae thinks. After everything, fair.

Deh flashes him a final grim before closing the door, still awkward, and it doesn’t last. She drops it for a split second, fully drops it, looks instead concerned, anxious.

Hanjae waits a moment, then moves before he knows it. He presses his ear against the shut door, closes his eyes and hopes to catch anything. A creek of wood. A vacuum cleaner being turned off. The sound of someone channel surfing. Deh saying what might be, “Haruki, what do you want me to do? I can’t know, love. I can’t know if you don’t tell me.”

Another sound drowns everything, nearer. Someone from the apartment on the left starts to unlock their door, it’s about to walk out, and it leaves Hanjae panicking, it makes him jog all the way out of the building, nonstop.

He makes the inverse way back home, alone. His own phone is a hot thing in his back pocket. When he gets to the dorm, Chihoon is the first person he bumps into, planted right beside the shoe rack. Hanjae’s seen him in this set of clothes, short shorts and a knockoff Pokemon shirt, more than he’s seen his own dad’s face these last few years.

Dylan grabs at Hanjae when he notices it’s him, pushes him back out quickly. He puts a finger in front of his mouth – quiet.

“I’ve given you some cover,” he whispers. They’re circling the house, Hanjae realizes, going to the backyard. “Said you were not feeling well. It won’t fly with Minwoo or Taesong, so think of something. And you're not gonna get paid this month, because of the clothes. Neither of you will.” He looks around, eyes sharp in a way Hanjae didn’t think they could be. “Where is he?”

“Deh’s,” Hanjae blurts out, and remembers he promised not to speak of her, grows meek.

He’s tired, deep in the bones tired, from all the walking, all the running. The socks inside his sneakers are still wet, his fingers have gone cold.

“Good,” Dylan says, remarkably unsurprised. “That’s good enough.”

There’s a moment of silence between them. In Hanjae’s head, a pinned image every time he blinks: Haruki’s eyes, red like a bruise.

“Chihoon hyung, I think– I think there’s something wrong with–”

Dylan’s grip on his arm is steady, but no longer comforting when he says, “Hanjae, listen, yes. Yes. Something’s wrong. Too many things–” He shakes his head, clicks his tongue once, and again. “No need for you to worry about it, because there’s nothing you can really do, okay? It’s been too long, now. The time for anyone to really do anything, over.”

He looks like he doesn’t want to be saying it, like all those words taste bitter, bad.

“So just keep being nice,” Dylan concludes, and his voice breaks at the end. “Be nice with him right now, alright? And patient, and normal, just like always, and…”

Dylan doesn’t say what else. He looks down, and Hanjae follows. Near their feet, a trail of black nicotine ash and tiny bits of paper; someone’s worry, someone’s wait.Kind, maybe, Hanjae concludes on his own. Maybe kind was what he was going to say.

March 12th & a Bit Of 13th, 2022.

Sunyoung immediately strikes Hanjae as someone who’s never held a small house party before, and it’s a bit painful to see her try.

She greets them at the door, a little overdressed: Chanel earrings, Chanel bag. “Is that everyone?”, she asks, craning her neck to peek behind them, and when they mumble ‘yes’ she visibly withers.

Taesong steps in front of them to give her a gift – a flower vase so yellow Zhiming had to look away from it, rubbing at his eyes.

She stares at it for a minute, frowns hard, then composes herself, says, “Ah! Thank you so much, oppa! This is so– Yeah, thanks! But you didn’t have to! Gon, baby! I said they didn’t have to!”

“I told you they don’t listen to me,” Haegon mutters. There’s a dark cloud over his face and Sunyoung seems to not mind it. She squeezes his arm when he passes her by, smiles at him prettily. 

She checks the corridor one more time, and for a moment Hanjae thinks she looks sad; that she looks angry.

The party is a housewarming party for the brand new double storey apartment in Nine One Hannam she’s sharing with her BombShell leader Yoorim, who strongly opposed herself to throwing anything. Hanjae catches a glimpse of her looking displeased and bothered behind the kitchen aisle, and bows his head a little – she rolls her eyes, turns her back on him, disappears behind a small group of people.

Beomseok refused to come, decided to take the afternoon to go grocery shopping, the night to visit family he can’t take Haegon to see; the side that calls him a parasite. It had been a clear jab, right at Haegon’s face. Even Minwoo thought it was insensitive, and his response to the invite had been nothing but a disgusted face that spelled out ‘no’.

Hanjae watches him move through the living room, greeting some people. Haegon’s been here yesterday, and the day before that, and if Hanjae’s not cautious, he’ll stay over despite their early shooting tomorrow.

“That old man put you on babysitting duty, eh, Hanhan?” Seungsoo leans in to whisper to him, somehow with a drink in hand – white wine. The smell of his cologne is already stuck to the collar of Hanjae’s bottom up by osmosis.

“He’s just concerned. It makes sense to be concerned.”

On their first day back from L.A, Haegon had announced over dinner that he now had a girlfriend: they met last week, and had been dating for three days. The situation had driven Beomseok crazy. Haegon asked if him if wanted to meet her every day for two weeks straight, and he said: no. He eventually got around to meet her and said with even more conviction: no, break up, now.

It’s an age gap, even if very small, but she’s about five years his industry senior, he told Hanjae. And Sunyoung’s from YG Entertainment, the face of too many brands. She’s going to eat him alive, spit him out, leave him heartbroken and Beomseok is going to have to deal with it, and he doesn’t want to have to deal with it.

“She can just like him. People can just like him,” Taesong tried to intervene, high pitched, and Beomseok cutted him off right away, said, “No. No, there’s something– Be serious, Taesong. No.”

The front door dings again, and it takes a long minute for Haegon to untangle his arms from Sunyoung’s waist and let her go get it. Hanjae watches her walk across the house, a firm walk of a supermodel, of someone important, and gets embarrassed with how bad he is at this, how obvious.

Another glimpse her way, and the person with their two feet planted on the ‘welcome home’ carpet is Haruki. He also said he wouldn’t come but gave no excuse, yet: here, dressed nicely. He’s got the same convenience store from years ago under one arm, the one from a memory.

They talk, talk, talk, and he still won’t leave the entrance. Haruki makes her laugh, the most genuine thing Hanjae’s seen Sunyoung do all night. He sees her look at him, look around, then lean closer again: point upstairs and give Haruki a thumbs up as he finally makes his way in, into the stairs and out of sight.

Sunyoung’s back on the couch, to Haegon, and Hanjae makes himself look. They’re fine, they appear very fine, holding hands, he doesn’t have to watch them all night, there’s no need to watch them at all, and–

Hanjae goes up the stairs, which he knows it’s technically off limits. He tries to not let his eyes wander to the photos on the walls, the books on the shelves tucked next to an award behind protective glass, a big shiny plaque framed above it.

There’s only one door with light peeking through, right at the end of the corridor. He taps at it three times, and waits. Another three taps, slightly stronger.

“Occupied,” a voice says from the inside – a tone he knows. “All night.”

Hanjae can’t think of what to say: can’t think of anything at all, for a second. He gives the door another hopeful tap, waits more, and he lets out a sigh of relief when it creeks open. He goes in, closes it quietly behind him, and looks down.

The room’s a bathroom, straight out of a home decoration magazine, all black and white. Haruki seems to be setting up an improv bar on the floor, in the big space between the bathtub and the sink. There’s a bottle of something Hanjae can’t read, blue and half empty, tucked in between his legs like a treasure.

“Ah, you,” he waves at Hanjae’s vague direction, not looking up. “Hello, you. I’m just– Don’t mind the mess. Someone made me something once. ‘Trying to put it together.”

Hanjae hums. He can’t make his hand ease its grip on the doorknob.

It’s been weeks since they abandoned the shoot, and since then Haruki’s been avoiding him constantly. Looks at him from across rooms and seems pained, constantly, and Hanjae hasn’t had the heart to come near.

“What is happening?” Haruki asks, suddenly, and tries to land a smile. He blinks a lot and then not enough looking up at Hanjae. “Down. Down there.”

“Nothing much.”

“How is he?”

“Haegon?” Hanjae asks, and Haruki nods at him loosely, mouths the name without making a sound: ‘Haegon’. “He– Uh, he seems alright.”

“Great couple, yes or no? For our maknae, is she great?”

“I– I don’t know.”

Disappointment flashes vividly through Haruki’s face, and it lands on a sad shagrin. “You don’t know,” he says, to himself, and goes back to emptying his bag with a slouch to his shoulders.

‘Be normal’, Dylan had said that day, his only instructions: ‘Be nice.’

Hanjae lets go of the door and goes to sit in front of him, legs crossed like his are. “What’s it supposed to taste like? The drink.”

There’s no humor in Haruki when he says, “Acid.”

He offers a thermo bottle to Hanjae filled with the failed replica. Hanjae takes a tiny sip and can’t swallow it, feels like his tongue is on fire, and it makes Haruki huff a laugh. “More disgusting than that.”

He makes more combinations that demand more tasting, and Hanjae at times struggles, at times doesn’t – Haruki empties a Soju bottle and refills it with Somaek, calls it ‘Hanjae’s palette cleanser’. He also makes Hanjae go downstairs to grab things they don’t have: more cups, ice and fruit juice, if Sunyoung has any, which she does – too many options.

Hanjae comes back from the trip and sets all his findings at Haruki’s feet, then feels weird about it, exposed about it, and pushes some of it closer to himself.

The bottle opener, they notice a minute later, has disappeared. Hanjae thinks he took it with him to the kitchen and abandoned it on the counter. Worry not, Haruki says; worry not!, because he knows how to open them with his front teeth. It’s a hidden skill, a secret talent.

Haruki asks him to hold a bottle close to his face so he can prove it, and Hanjae does so, but it’s a frail grip, not good. Haruki puts a hand over his to make it steadier, makes it worse. Another hand, a shove closer until their knees are touching. Hanjae adds his free hand into the pile, the lonely hand, and Haruki looks straight at him – looks like he’s saying, ‘Bet?’

It takes a second, really. A pop and the lid comes off in the company of an enormous foam eruption. Haruki gets both his hands away, does a smiley flourish: ‘ta-da!’

“But you shook it! Too much, you–!’ He laughs, and can’t stop laughing. Hanjae’s still holding the bottle and tries to hand it to him, but Haruki shakes his head ‘no’. “For you. It is for you.”

It’s bland beer, he takes notice when he drinks it, but somehow it tastes sweeter.

From the corner of his eyes he catches a glimpse of metal in a corner, and it’s Haruki’s new phone, exiled.

Hanjae is surprised to hear himself ask him, “Are the calls– the calls still coming? The ones from–”

“Always,” Haruki responds, eerily nonchalant. “Always will.”

“It’s not over, then? You still–”

“It is. It is over. It is over the way it can be over.”

“What wouldhe,” Hanjae closes his eyes, reiterates, “If it’s over, what would he still want with you?”

“What do you think,” Haruki asks, staring fixedly at the alcohol going from one bottle to the other. A bit of it it’s running straight to the floor. “What do you think people want with me?”

It’s said– weird. Something in his uncaring tone makes a lump of sadness form in Hanjae’s throat.

“Hyung, you know that, if you everneed to talk to anyone about anything. Me and the guys, we all– We all listen. We would listen.”

“Anything?” Haruki pretends to be impressed. “Big. That is big.”

“Seriously. I’m being serious.”

Haruki looks up at him. Even more alcohol spills to the floor.

“Okay. Okay, anything. Anything…” he hums, dropping the bottles, mimicking being in thought with an obnoxious pout. His mouth is now a purple dot, and his eyes a shiny brown daze...

Hanjae often catches himself wondering if he just knows. If he looks into a mirror and just knows that he’s beautiful in a way that looks hand drawn, that looks meticulously planned: a subject of equal envy and admiration. If Sangwon ever told him that, and if so, how many times, had it come close to enough, had he used the right words to say it, did Haruki believe him when he said it, or if he didn’t – what did it make him feel? What exactly did he make him feel?

Hanjae always thought he was so mean, so bitter. He can’t remember ever hearing him say anything nice to anyone about anything.

Hanjae’s staring, he’s realized, and his eyes hurt. He makes them look down to where Haruki’s got a firm hold around the slim of a bottleneck, tapping a weird rhythm into it, impossible to decipher. He has long fingers with hard skin on them, which isn’t something you would expect. He used to paint, used to do calligraphy; used to go to a prestigious arts academy during high school, all boys.

Hanjae’s still starring, and he’s too close to drunk to properly command himself to stop. He hears Haruki huffs an unheard laugh, suddenly, short and maybe frustrated, maybe not that, and Hanjae’s head snaps up to his face to meet it.

He’s being stared at, too – is being analyzed, too.

“I thought of something. Something I want to say, a thing,” Haruki announces. The grin on his face suddenly looks very, very sharp, like there’s something tugging the corners of his mouth up. “I will whisper to you. On your ear. ‘Gimme your ear and I will tell.”

And with that he comes forward, a sudden and ungracious movement, and doesn’t stop when they’re front to front, an inch apart. He climbs Hanjae up – actually climbs him up, his legs around the middle of his body, cageing him in.

Haruki grims again and it’s lazily, in slow motion. He puts a hand on Hanjae’s chin, tips it high, says, “Not your ear.”

He turns his head to the side. His nose rovers near Hanjae’s head, and Hanjae tries to escape it in reflex, but they’re all too slow, drowned in alcohol.

Into his ear, lips touching skin, Haruki says, “I know you like me. For a very long time. Since that one time. Ever since we went out, we got drunk, that one time.”

“Sorry,” Hanjae mutters, hushed.

“‘Sorry’,” Haruki laughs again, like that’s the funniest word there is, like it’s the meanest. It rings so loud, it has an echo. “Now you sorry?”

Hanjae sinks more into the floor, almost laying down, and Haruki follows, saying, “Are you going away? This close? I am this close, and you going away?”

They’re kissing before Hanjae fully processes how, and it’s a weird kiss at a weird angle; Haruki won’t bend his body all the way down, and Hanjae has to keep craning his neck to meet him midway, his elbows pressing against the tiles, hurting.

He feels a hand slide up his shirt almost immediately, and Hanjae understands, with drunken horror, that he’s being undressed – quickly.

“Ah, wait–” He says, and then can’t get out anything else: Haruki shoved a thumb inside his mouth, in between his teeth, as he goes for the spot where Hanjae’s shoulder and neck meet.

“You smell like home here,” he says, a goosebump. He buries his face there, opens his mouth above it, bites and sucks hard enough to make Hanjae jump  – for him to know it’ll leave a pinkish mark, evidence–

It’s exactly then and there that someone bursts in through the door, says a curse loudly, startles the two of them slightly apart, knocks the air out of their lungs.

“Close your eyes! I need to pee right now, right now, close your eyes!”

It’s a tall woman, this one – Hanjae sees her quick rush to the toilet and closes his eyes tight shut.

“If any of you try to act funny and take a single peek, I’ll fucking castrate you both– Hey! Hey, you, back on the floor, don’t come near, I’m fucking serious, I’ll kill you, you fucking–!”

The door clicks shut, and it takes Hanjae a moment to take in the lack of heat above and around him, to correlate the two: Haruki’s gone, walked out, left him.

From the side, he hears an instrident, “Can you at least cover your fucking boner, dude?!”

Hanjae rolls to his side, facing the opposite wall to where the toilet is; he pushes his knuckles into his shut eyes, for good measure. He waits for the girl to finish peeing, and tries not to have an anxiety attack or a heart attack or a nerve attack about everything that happened in the last ten minutes: Haruki on top of him, Haruki no longer on top of him, having to hear a stranger peeing.

“I’m done,” she announces, and he turns back to the same position as before.

There’s little dots of light in his vision, dancing. The girl’s using the sink now, and she has a blonde bob, so blonde and so short. It follows the shape of her mouth and up, even shorter at the back.

“Not a word from you, ever,” she warns, drying her hands on her skirt, pushing it down more, back in place. She gives him a pointed glare that makes Hanjae look down at the state he’s in, at his busted open shirt, a single button in the middle holding it all together. “Not a word from me. Now get the fuck out, please. People need to use the bathroom.”

And she gets going too, without closing the door all the way. The hum of the party downstairs carries over.

Hanjae inhales, looking at the bright ceiling light. His fingers have gone pruney where they were holding him.

[…]

Eventually Hanjae has to get out of the suite, and do a walk of shame back to the housewarming party. He takes down with him all the glass and cups he can manage, not a lot of them, goes straight to the kitchen sink, and begins to wash them, it’s done with them, goes for all of Sunyoung and Yoorim’s dishes.

Around him, the kitchen has emptied out – on the front the living room, mostly emptied out, too, except for little clicks. He spots J.J right in the center of the one installed in the couch, gesticulating enthusiastically, telling someone some story until they make eye contact. He stops, excuses himself, rushes near.

Up close, Jiahang looks at him, up and down, bug eyed, and Hanjae understands he didn’t do a good job of piecing himself back together.

He got a glimpse of his face in the mirror before walking out: lips glossy, bangs far apart and sticking up, somehow, not all the buttons of his shirt tucked in the right cases.

“Hanjae, oh my God. Dylan, Dylan, look!” He calls out, and Hanjae sees Chihoon appear on his left, face slightly dazed. “Oh my God, Dylan! Hanjae!”

“You fucking animal!” Seungsoo, coming out of nowhere, slaps him on the chest hard. “Who? Who who who who?”

They’re all too close, too soon, and Hanjae can’t look anyone in the eyes for too long– he just can’t.

He catches a glimpse of Blonde Bob Piss Girl in a corner, looking bored, on her phone, and stares at her for a moment too long. Everyone follows, looks at her too, and his bandmates erupt into enthusiastic ‘Eeeeeeh!’s. Someone, proprably Seungsoo still, raises his soupy arm up so he can be given high fives, and Hanjae doesn’t know what to do – to let the lie linger or to kill it. What can he even say? What can he say if not that–

Hanjae finds himself grabbing Dylan’s sleeve and tugging at it, leaving behind a damp. He feels like a little kid that broke something, suddenly – overwhelmingly so. “Where ‘d Haruki go?”

“Dude, I didn’t see him. You sure?” Chihoon asks, and Hanjae’s not; he’s not sure.

“Whaaaaat? Haruki came? Haruki’s here?”

“Great. Another one to hunt down. We’re never gonna leave this fucking place in time,” Jiahang whines. “Yoorim noona’s going to delete my number.”

Hanjae asks all of them at once, “We’re leaving?”

“Yeah, you didn’t hear? Sunyoung and Haegon ditched,” Seungsoo says, and Hanjae’s stomach drops. “It’s her house and they ditched, disappeared, poof! Yoorim’s pissed, told everyone to leave. And Taeng’s freaking out! Someone broke his little vase, someone spilled something on him. I think he’s gonna snap. We need to get that freak home.”

“Shit.”

“Yes, Hanjae,” Seungsoo laughs. “Old man was right, after all… Shit.”

[...]

They do a small search around the apartment, the balcony, and conclude: no Haruki anywhere, so they group everyone they have to leave, go wait to be picked up on the sidewalk in front of the Nine One Hannam gates.

“You just dreamed him up, Hanhan! Wouldn’t be the first time,” Seungsoo jokes. It’s a bad joke. O.z shoves him in the chest hard about it, tells him, “Quiet.”

Hanjae looks straight ahead, not at them. In front of him J.J keeps bouncing on the wheel of his feet, saying, ‘I’m going in the front, I’m passenger seat, forget it, it’s me me me me,’ even though no one’s putting up a fight about it.

Minwoo pulls up soon enough on the curve in one of the two black company vans, and downs the window just to give them all an open scowl, then a frown. “I’m only seeing seven of you.”

J.J circles the car to get to the front door, struggles a little to get it open. “Hyung, you’re not gonna believe.”

“I don’t wanna hear it, Jiahang.”

“Shut up, you do. You really really really really do. You were–,” and then he becomes aware of the slouched figure of Hanjae trailing behind him, turns and frowns. “What did I just say!”

“No, I’m…” Hanjae looks at Minwoo looking at him, one eyebrow raised, says, “Sorry.”

Minwoo pinches at his nose, hard. “Just get in the goddamn car, Hanjae, Jesus Christ.”

Hanjae thinks, out of everyone who has a driver’s license, Minwoo drives the shittiest. He needs glasses, he never wears them, he grumbles curses at every slow driver and every rush driver and every driver, in general.

On the way home, he stops the van only once, by popular demand. Taesong steps out to vomit, and spends the rest of the ride jittery about it, cracking his knuckles even when they make no sound.

“We’re so fucked,” Chihoon says when they park inside the dorm’s garage, rubbing his eyes. “It’s 3AM. We’re so fucked.”

While everyone rushes to their rooms to piece pajamas together and form a long row to shower, Hanjae’s elbow to elbow with Dylan, going up the stairs to the second floor as quietly as they can.

He and Haruki have, by far, the best room in the whole house: spacious, with a nice window. It used to be Haruki and Sangwon’s up until he got fired – some excuse about rooming with the manager to learn Korean quicker, about making sure Haruki wouldn’t sneak beer into his room. It makes Hanjae sick now, seeing it, standing so close to it.

Dylan tries the handle once, and the door doesn’t budge, only makes a stubborn click – locked.

Hanjae dries his hand on his jeans, still wet, somehow, asks him, “Is he– He’s in there? Or…?”

Chihoon rests his head against the mahogany and sort of sighs, sort of laughs. “Yeah, definitely home. He’s the only one with the key to lock me out. Classic. Just classic.”

“Get my bed,” Hanjae says – implores. “Use mine, you can– mine, I’ll couch.”

“You’ll couch?” Chihoon looks at him with the trembling smile of someone who’s about to laugh. It falls off his face quickly when he takes in the guilt Hanjae knows he’s wearing openly on his face.

“Hyung, I–” It’s out of his mouth before Hanjae even knows it. “Tonight, something – Something has happened, and I think, think I should– say.”

Dylan’s giving him an analytical once over, and he stops at his moving hands, on his marked neck, looks at the door again – locked. 

“Hanjae,” he says his name like it’s an insult, and for a moment Hanjae feels like it really is – his name, an insult.

He crumbles. “I’m sorry, so, so sorry, we just– I didn’t mean to– It was just, just a kiss, I think, and I– I–”

“You kissed him?! ‘You think’? What does that mean? What do you mean ‘you think’?!”

Hanjae looks around and then down, behind him. “Dylan…” he manages, airy, and doesn’t know what he wants the rest of the phrase to be, where he’s trying to take it.

Chihoon’s mouth hangs open, a painful disbelief, and then slowly shuts.

“You know what,” he says harshly, but not angrily – he sounds more disappointed than anything, more tired than anything. “I don’t want to know. Not now. I’ll know, just– Not now. But fucking Hell, Hanjae, you. You just had to, didn’t you? You saw an opportunity and you just had to.”

Hanjae’s breath catches. Dylan is a figure in his eyes, growing blurry.

“I’m taking your bed,” he announces. ”Eveytime he kicks me out from this day on, I’m sleeping on your bed.”

He storms off, his bare feet on the floor a sound until it isn’t anymore.

Hanjae knocks on the door, a small tap. Nothing.

He thinks of saying it again: sorry. But no one’s around to hear it, no one’s around to accept it. There’s no point.

[therecordconnection]

Playlist: Aboard a Tidal Wave - An Ode to The Beach Boys in the Seventies

Youtube Version (For Non-Spotify Users) Can Be Found Here!

Cover Photo: "Peachy Wave" by Heidi Heiser // Record Border Created By: @saradika-graphics

Playlist Description: An exploration of The Beach Boys' work in the 70s. While they were no longer hitmakers starting with this decade, they were still a creatively ambitious and wildly interesting group.

I watched that new Beach Boys documentary on Disney+. I thought it was alright, but it was definitely made for people who have no knowledge about who the Beach Boys are. I ended up being disappointed by it because most of the documentary covered their beginnings and hitmaking years in the sixties. There wasn't much talk about their career in the seventies, which is the period of their career I find the most fascinating.

Brian Wilson's mental breakdown and subsequent mental health issues left him M.I.A. through most of the decade, which meant that the other Beach Boys were left without their captain. Also, the boys were hit by the tidal wave of being strangers in a strange land. The California that the band had immortalized in song had changed and moved on without them in the mid-sixties, with their stomping ground first being dominated by the likes of hippy rock bands like the Grateful Dead, the Doors, Jefferson Airplane, and Jimi Hendrix, then the rock bands of the seventies like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and the Rolling Stones. The Beach Boys were written off and considered nothing more an old nostalgia act and a relic of another time.

Despite Brian Wilson no longer being at the helm of the songwriting, the Beach Boys weren't completely out of the water. If the downside was that they were probably never gonna be chart topping hitmakers again no matter what they did, then the positive was that they were free to do whatever the hell they wanted to try. There are no real expectations if everyone thinks you're gonna fail anyway.

Here, you will find thirty songs pulled from the eight albums they made throughout the seventies (from 1970's Sunflower to 1979's L.A. (Light Album). I initially just had them in chronological order, but eventually decided that it would be more interesting to shuffle them all and present it that way. No matter how I organized it, none of them really fit nice and clean into common themes. The boys all went in wildly different directions during the decade and you'll hear all of that here.

To give you an idea of some of the things you'll find here, I'll give you a short list:

The Beach Boys doing Steely Dan months before Steely Dan released their debut ("Here She Comes")

The Beach Boys more-or-less inventing Shoegaze/dream pop before it became a thing ("All I Wanna Do")

The first few seconds of "Deirdre," a very happy and lovely song, later being used as a sample to create the creepiest music piece from Earthbound ("The Place")

Carl Wilson getting psychedelic and other-worldly ("Feel Flows")

Brian Wilson getting their at-the-time-manager Jack Rieley to sing the lead vocal for "A Day in the Life of a Tree" because he thought Jack's voice sounded the closest to what a tree would sound like.

Brian Wilson strange lines, "Neptune is god of the sea-ea-ea / Pluto is too far to see-ee-ee" and "If Mars has life on it, I might find my wife on it" ("Solar System")

Mike Love singing a verse in Japanese ("Sumahama")

The Beach Boys attempting (and honestly kinda nailing) disco ("Here Comes the Night")

The Beach Boys were so so SO much more than songs about surf, sun, cars, and girls and this playlist is in honor of that beautiful and delightfully strange decade of creativity where they were just trying anything they thought would work. They were, as Frank Reynolds would say, "gettin' weird with it." They did what Mike Love hated and fucked with the formula. We're all better for it. If you've ever wondered if there's more to the Beach Boys than "Fun, Fun, Fun" or "Wouldn't It Be Nice," or you're just discovering them for the first time, then I hope this playlist gives you some new songs to enjoy. :)

Track Listing:

Sail On, Sailor

Funky Pretty

You Need a Mess of Help To Stand Alone

Here She Comes

The Trader

All I Wanna Do

Deirdre

At My Window

Disney Girls (1957)

Long Promised Road

Feel Flows

A Day in the Life of a Tree

'Til I Die

Cool, Cool Water

All This Is That

Surf's Up

Solar System

The Night Was So Young

I'll Bet He's Nice

Let's Put Our Hearts Together

She's Got Rhythm

Rock and Roll Music

Wontcha Come Out Tonight?

Susie Cincinnati

Match Point Of Our Love

Lady Lynda

Full Sail

Angel Come Home

Sumahama

Here Comes the Night

Bonus: The greatest and weirdest Beach Boys song ever recorded: "Ding Dang." It wasn't included in the playlist because it would've been unfair to the other songs. You wouldn't have wanted to listen to anything else.

[crumblinggothicarchitecture]

" ... "You drew scars..." felt, to me, like she was saying "you romanticized my flaws then they got worse after you left." so like, accepting your lovers flaws because you love them for them like a real life regular adult relationship. Then she kind of blames the problems she already had, the scars opening up, on the guy leaving as per usual. ... "

Isn't Cardigan supposed to be fictional? I'm not sure it's about her own life. And Cardigan, August and Betty are all linked right? The same story from the 3 people's perspectives; James, Betty and August girl. I think that's why the songs don't stand that well on their own.

James cheats on Betty with August. August genuinely liked james, but he just used her for the summer. Then he goes back to Betty with the excuse of "I'm only seventeen" and "slept next to her, but dreamt of you all summer long".

In that folklore long pond thing Taylor said that in her mind James and Betty end up together, which says a lot about her and her views on love.

Yeah- I realize it's fictional. Perhaps I worded my last response poorly, (Sorry guys I am running on very little sleep and heat exhaustion rn) but I'm just saying without a deep understanding of the Swift Lore- people will not get the thematic point of the song. Also, really nothing in the song interconnects the three "summer fling" characters- like the only reason we know it's all connected is because Swift said it was- later. It's not self-evident in the song.

This is what I mean when I say without all the extra information- no one would understand her music because it's just not self-contained. It's not strong enough writing by itself- she has to go back in later, with her interviews, and further explain everything. It would be better if the narratives of the songs interconnected just within the songs themselves- but it's all just vague allusions wherein we, audience members, are supposed to guess that it's all connected.

If she wanted a three song-narrative-arc, she should have made it self-evident within the music itself.

It's like when book authors give interviews later and explain that a character is doing something for some plot reason- it shows weak writing skills. People should just be able to enjoy the music (or book) and be able to understand the full plot from the work itself.

Tbfr I didn't understand it was all connected until after hearing her interview about it. Even then, there are like three more songs I could argue are tied into this "plot-mess" she's got going on, only because she revisits the same boring-vaugly late-teen-to-early-college characters over and over.

Everything I said though- about how it's a self-victiminzing song in which we're supposed to root for the narrator as the boy returns to her despite being a cheater- and how fucking weird that premise is, I still stand by. Yes- it's a weird way to view love and a weird way to talk about teenagers making mistakes in relationships. I think it does say something about how Swift views love.

Edit - Sorry, omg, I feel like my tone in this response is really short and negative. I'm not trying to sound like that :S I wrote this too quickly- I appreciate your perspective though! Thank you!

[laureliciousdefinition]

hai….i’m back….here to give more modern (plus some general) hcs!! :3

⭑i like to think of john and abi as highschool sweethearts :) But they were pretty on and off, so everyone was surprised when they made it to senior prom (john wore those tuxedo t-shirts)and eventually graduation! they got pregnant with jack a few months after graduating

⭑when it’s time for spring cleaning, DUTCH IS THE LOUDEST MF IN THE HOUSE. he’s blasting the 70s music, waking up everyone in the house very loudly announcing that it’s spring cleaning day…poor hosea, john, and arthur

⭑i like to think charles makes these super pretty bracelets and sells them online :3 some of the gang members got some! they’re very meticulously crafted and he takes pride in his art!

⭑Karen is def a crazy cat lady. She has FOUR OF THEM!!! She’d give three of the cats really pretty names but let Sean name her most recent one…in which he named the poor cat “napkin” 💀

⭑Dutch and Hosea have an unreal amount of hawaiian pattern shirts..it’s crazy. hosea wears them in the spring and summer but dutch wears them year round

⭑For some reason, it’s tradition on Arthur’s birthday to go to Texas Roadhouse (I know he’d FUCK UP that bread they give as appetizers). He usually has his family, an s/o, and a couple friends there :)

⭑Speaking of fucking up rolls…I think Artie in general would just have a guilty soft spot to sweets. His s/o would come back with those rolls or just any pastry or candy and arthur will feel so special and spoiled! He’ll also do the same thing for them in return :) (Or just any kinda fave food they like)

⭑Lenny was a SUPER smart kid in school. I like to think in the modern au he just graduated outta highschool, but he got all of these scholarships and awards for being such a smart kid. He’d def major in some sort of writing or literacy thing in college

⭑Sadie can and will destroy anyone at those bull riding things at restaurants. she’s got a plaque of her name on it at a restaurant she won at!

⭑This is more of a general one, but seeing Arthur and John compared to eachother is so funny…Arthur is like this big bear while John is skinny and dorito shaped

⭑It’s also funny seeing the heights of the vandermatthews (name still in progress) family. From shortest to tallest it goes Dutch (5’8”…short dutch all the way), Hosea (5’10”), John (5’11”), and Arthur (6’2”)

⭑One time John borrowed Dutch’s laptop and clicked on a weird website, giving the laptop a virus. John was grounded for a few days and Arthur didn’t stop teasing him about it

OKAY!!! that’s all i have rn ^^ i think i might be saying too many hcs but i love making them…they’re too fun!! (sorry for showing my arthur favoritism again sighhhh 😭😭)

So sorry it took me several days to get to this, real life has had me busy 😔 but I’m here now and EEEEEEEE so fun and silly!!!!

-I’ve also always seen John and Abi as a high school sweethearts type of thing, I think they broke up and got back together so many times in that immature high school way until like senior year when they just stayed together

-Dutch is that one vine where the guy was dancing to Morning Train by Sheena Easton

-crying real tears rn imagining Charles crafting stuff for his pals🥹🥹🥹🥹 I could see him eventually getting into bigger crafts too

-Listen I’m gonna defend Sean bc I just KNOW that napkin the cat fits her namesake so well. It’s one of those skrunkly white kittens

-Arthur having a sweet tooth is canon in my heart sorry ladies, I think he’d enjoy baking goodies for his friends/partners bc he’s suchhhhh an acts of service/gift giver love language kinda guy

-I think Lenny was just one of those kids in high school that everyone loved. He was nice to everyone and genuinely really smart, sorry haters but he definitely got voted prom king or something. As he should!!!!!!

-Sadie drives a cool truck but not in a douchebag way, like that woman is hauling shit AROUND!!!!!!!!

These are all so fun and so silly! It’s been a rough week so I genuinely enjoyed getting to read these :) yall please never hesitate to blow up my inbox with thoughts like these!!